Well, phooey. My beloved sewing machine (Brother PC420PRW) suddenly started acting weird a couple of hours ago. It sews just fine ... no problems at all ... but when you push the button to automatically cut the threads, the thread cutter makes a rather unhappy grinding sound.
Neither threads are cut.
Here's what I've done:
Changed the needle
Re-threaded both upper and lower threads (several times)
Changed the spool of thread to a different one
Changed the bobbin to a different one
Turned the machine off and back on (several times)
Spent over an hour cleaning it. I already keep it as clean as I possibly can, but I did find some overlooked lint mooshed up under the feed dog mechanism. Cleaned that out.
Googled my fingers off trying to find a solution.
Nothing helped.
I really miss the thread cutter. It saves so much time AND thread.
But that's not the only thing ...
While I was cleaning the lint out, I noticed something odd about the bobbin case. It looks like it's been broken or "chewed" off ... perhaps somehow jabbed by the needle. (??) See pic below. I
did break a needle about a
month ago while sewing a multi-layered project. I didn't think anything of it, and if the bobbin case was damaged as a result, I didn't notice it (and I sew pretty much every day!). There were no further problems at all until today when the thread cutter suddenly stopped working. Weird. I don't know if the broken bobbin case could be affecting the thread cutter, and if it is, how did it take a month (??) to cause a problem?
I've looked and looked, but I can't find the hickey-do that actually cuts the threads. The manual is no help whatsoever. It
does say not to press the thread cutter button without fabric and thread present, so I can't just press the button with the bobbin area opened up and watch to see what gadget actually tries to cut the thread. If I could SEE it, I could probably find the culprit! LOL!
I'll get a new bobbin case ordered ASAP, but in the meantime, do you think the thread cutter problem could be caused by something else? Do you know of anything else I could check? Thanks in advance for any advice/thoughts you might have!
(Whew, this was a long message!)
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