I did all my quilting on a Singer 301a until I got my new Janome 7700. I think there are other older Singers out there with a larger harp opening that would have made life a little easier when doing FMQ but you can't beat the easy maintenance and cleaning of these older machines. I have my Mother's old machine and it is almost as old as I am. I think some of the older Singer dress making and tailoring machines would have had a larger opening to the right of the needle so you would have more room to manipulate your quilt while quilting but I don't know what the model numbers would be. Check with a Singer repairman or look on Craigslist. I find a lot of old Singers listed on Craigslist. Anything built after the mid 60's isn't worth having. The machine my DH bought me for a wedding present in 1969 ended up as target practice in the back field after being to the repair man over a dozen times in 2 years. The repairman said that the new machines were nothing but junk and that was the last Singer machine I owned that was new. I'll take an old one any day. Ann in TN