Littledreamdevil

Hi Everyone,
Thank you for all the information everyone gave me on my Kenmore 8 Stitch Sewing Machine Model 158 13450. I have been buying some presser feet for my machine, now that I know it is low shank...Would have been lost without all your help. I come on here almost every day and read what everyone is buying and the machines everyone is putting together. It is just amazing to me how much you all know. If I live to be a million years old (hope not) I sure wont know a rain drop in a cup of what I see most of you do in your post. How in the world did you figure out how to do such amazing stiff. I have been on the Internet for three weeks straight now, every spare minute I have trying to figure out if my machine can take a Monogram Foot, button hole attachment, thing that would make my sewing easier. Stuff that is different than the usual presser feet. How do I figure out what feet my machine take? When I go on ebay or sites like that to find vintage parts, the feet don't say high or low shank, and how do I find out just what vintage parts my machine can use, What is the "trick" to knowing all this stuff with out spend money on parts that your machine can't use and how do you know what parts you machine can use. I sure don't want to get stuck with parts my machine can't use and have to just put the part in my husband garage...ha ha..I already told him to stay out of my new sewing room.

Thank you
littledreamdevil

J Miller

littledreamdevil,

Go to Sew-Classic { http://www.shop.sew-classic.com/ } then go to section #3- Feet & Attachments.
{ http://www.shop.sew-classic.com/3-Fe...chments_c4.htm }.
There is an instruction guide on how to determine what feet your machine takes at the bottom of the feet listings.


Joe

Littledreamdevil

thank you Joe,
Yes I know my Kenmore 8 Stitch Sewing Machine Model 158 13450 takes low shank feet....but can i use a vantage Monogram Foot, button hole attachment, thing that would make my sewing easier. I see some machines can, but even when I called Kenmore, Sears,and singer they couldn't tell if my machine could or couldn't and if it could which ones or how to find. The guy at sears told me just to buy one and if it didn't work just buy another till I got the right one..and no they don't sell vintage feet for my machine. But I don't have that kind of money to waste on just buying on thing after the other till I get it runs quite. Thank you for your help
littledreamdevil.

Quincunx

When we look at pictures of feet for sale we take the picture and turn the feet around in our mind's eye and look at it from the side and imagine a ruler behind it. I think you are not strong in picturing an object in your mind's eye. That is Ok. We have cheap photos now and can take a lot of pictures instead. No need to imagine. Just take your nearest camera and the feet you have now that you KNOW they are low shank. Line up the camera shot the same as the pictures for sale have it and take a picture. Now you have a picture that you KNOW is low shank and is lined up the same as the pictures for sale. No need to turn anything in your mind's eye.

That will not help quite as much for the buttonholers and monogrammers. You will be able to take your low shank picture and compare it to the _shank_ of the buttonholer or monogrammer foot. And so you will not buy a high shank monogrammer or a top clamp buttonholer by accident. But I do not know enough about Kenmores to know whether there was more than one kind of low shank fancy attachment.

When the set for sale says "snap-on" and also "adapter" the adapter is for putting on a low shank machine. The feet snap on to the adapter, the adapter stays screwed onto your machine.

Here is the online manual link again. It has drawings of the optional accessories you want but only from one angle.

miriam

There seem to be more low shank button holers available than high. There are slant shank button holers. They all seem to say SLANT on the top of the clamp that you screw it to the machine with. Straight shank button holders sometimes say STRAIGHT on the top of the clamp - but you can't rely on that being there since some button holers are older than the slant machines.

Macybaby

Most of the low shank, japanse machines take the same attachments as fit Singer low shank machines - with the possible exception of some of the Kenmores, because Sears like to be different. They would specifically ask mfg to make something slightly different just so Sears could say thiers was unique. Made it so you had to buy parts from Sears too . . .

Anyway, it is very likely that any attachment made to fit a Singer short shank (straight) will work. Singer also made SLANT shank machines, so the attachments are straight and slant. Other companies made High shank machines.

I've got a lot of attachments for all sorts of machines, including a lot of buttonholers and mongrammers.

Rodney

The problem with some Kenmores is they used special buttonholers and monogrammers that ran on a little gear in the bed of the machine. I have no idea how to tell which of those will work if that's the case with yours. If you have the manual for your machine you might get lucky and find part numbers for the accessories you want.
Macybaby is our resident expert on feet and attachments.
I know I sometimes struggle with recognizing which feet fit which machine too. One example is I have an old National made machine that uses top clamp feet. Be happy yours uses side clamp feet. IIRC Macybaby has identified around a dozen different sizes of top clamp feet. The width of the attachment slot is the same as for a White but the needle hole is closer. It's very hard to tell from pictures which are the correct feet and the boxes usually just say "Attachments".
Rodney
So far I think I've seen mostly White Rotary feet. Not buying right now, just trying to learn for when the time comes.

Macybaby

Rodney, if it's short shank, it may not use that gear. however since the other style runs off the needlebar, if they fit, they should work also.

For reference, I'm pretty sure the older Kenmores that were top clamp were made by White. I know almost all the older Montgomery Wards machines were made by National under assorted badged names.

For the top clamp, a good clue is to see what the shirr plate and/or underbaider looks like (assuming it's original to the set) National and White feet may look almost identical (whites are 1/16" longer between the gap and needle hole) but the plates look quite different -

And for US made top clamp machines, figuring out what attachment fit goes a long way to figure out who made it.
Once they switched over to side clamp, that got uniform (they all match Singer) so it does not help, but makes getting attachments easy.

I was recently reading something about how Singer supplied the information for the Japanese sewing machine market, and that is why they all side clamp instead of top clamp machines. Have not verified that though, but it would make sense out of why Singer's method, which was different than all the rest, became the most common.

J Miller

littledreamdevil,

There is three maybe four different Kenmore button hollers that might work that that machine as well as the typical Singer or Greist made ones.

I think I know what your machine looks like, but if you could post a pic of it as well as a pic of the bobbin area with the slide plate off, I can put together a pictorial of those I have that will fit and work.

Joe

Littledreamdevil

Ok, I will take a picture and post it today. thank you everyone for the help.