I want someone who can thoroughly inspect my featherweight's wiring. I live out in the sticks and am about 2 hours from Indianapolis so I guess that is my best bet but even then, how do I find a shop that is experienced working on these? Is there a website or something that lists shops like this? I took it apart and looked at the wires but I can't tell anything with my untrained eye. It looks like they're all intact but I can't see what it looks like inside the casings or tubings. I emailed sew-classic but she suggested finding a local source.

Do you have a local singer dealer that has a technician? I had my 401A fixed by my local singer dealer. He did a great job.

Ditto...Go to the Yellow Pages and lookup Sewing machine repair or Specifically Singer...Or try Singer Web sites for dealers in your area and contact them and they can recommend who they use.

No there are no local dealers here. None. There used to be two different ones but they closed up shop about 10 yrs ago and no one else opened. The other dealers, which are an hour away, only work on their own brands (bernina and janome). Actually they send them in to the company for repairs. I'll see if I can find yellow pages online for Indy. I don't have a phone book here for them.

eta: according to the singer website there's a place about 2 hours 20 minutes from me. UGH. I'm seriously considering just selling it. It's too much trouble driving 4.5 hours round trip twice for this.

thanks again. I checked the yellow pages online and there's a shop about 25 minutes away that claims to be able to do the work. I mentioned that I've had it a year and hadn't used it and he seemed to know that it would need some work like oiling and lubing on a regular basis, especially from sitting, so he seemed to know what I was talking about. The guy I talked to isn't the one that does the work on machines but at least he seems to know something about them.

Gale - I sent you a PM

I wouldn't worry about finding a Singer dealer. The wiring is really simple, and just about any reputable local sewing machine shop can handle it.

BTW - You can do the oiling & lubing yourself...DO NOT pay someone to do it!!! It's really really not necessary. I have several vintage machines, and I have not taken even one of them to a shop for "oiling and lubing". It's so simple I taught my 18 year old grandaughter how to do it on her vintage machine!! :-)

We had to learn how to do the basic cleaning, oiling and lubing in my freshman home ec class back in the prehistoric era (my kids tell me that's when I was in school).

We did not however touch anything to do with wiring.

you could always find a great shop and ship it. I did that with my Janome and my Bernina when I moved, I always shipped it back to where I bought it to have it serviced. good luck!

I would just get the rewiring kit from Sew Classic and do it myself. She has all the instructions right on her website and has a free service manual you can download when you make a purchase. I just emailed her and she sent me links to everything I would need, the links of instructions etc. You can rewire it for under $20. It's not a hard job at all, all you need is the correct screwdrivers. It's one of the smartest things you can do with a vintage machine, especially since the wiring is one of the few things that ever go wrong with them. I can tell you for sure that the wiring on my grandmother's machine lasted exactly thrity years. I was sewing on it the day the wiring burned up in 1976. Scared the crap out of me. Now, I'm finally going to fix it.