Originally Posted by BoJangles
Originally Posted by miriam
Miriam, is your sister's machine the little 158.104? I took the machine to Girls' Night Out last night to clean and use the machine. It will sew, it was pretty clean, but I can't get the needle out of the right hand position. I found a manual on-line last night that mentions nothing about being able to change the needle position so I think the needle is stuck in the right zig of the zig zag. The machine will stitch a straight stitch with the needle on the right side, but it won't do a zig zag. Nothing appears broken, the machine looks really good, but I know that needle should move over to the middle. There is a single hole needle plate with the machine and a straight stitch foot -- neither can be used now - needle would hit. I have the zig zag foot and zig zag plate on now. I also can't get the clutch to disengage to wind a bobbin. I wound the bobbin with the needle going ninety miles an hour, but I can't turn the wheel to disengage the needle so the bobbin winder can wind. In the manual I printed out, some of the 158's had the push in wheel to disengage the needle, some had the wheel that turns! Mine does not push in, should turn, but does neither? Any suggestions? I am not familiar with the Kenmore machines!
Nancy
When I work on one I find... the first thing I do is tear it down and clean old dead oil out of any moving part with kerosene - careful of anything plastic, belts, wires & motors - OLD DEAD OIL is probably a lot of the problem - don't force anything to move until you do that - any rust? Go over it as many times as it takes. Then reassemble and new SEWING MACHINE oil only. I don't know if that machine has any plastic parts but always look and see if they are broken and be careful when cleaning them. Are the belts ok?
Yep, did all that! I actually spent 2.5 hours last night at our monthly Girls Night Out cleaning thread out of a FW that would not sew! It had probably 12 inches of thread wrapped in and around the hook/race! I didn't get to spend as much time as I had hoped on my new Kenmore, but I did take it apart and clean and oil it. I always do that first. The machine is not rusty anywhere. After soaking the wheel/clutch with oil all morning, my DH finally got the clutch to turn -- it was just screwed on so tight he was afraid he'd break it by forcing the clutch! Now he has the machine taken apart trying to figure out why it won't do the zag part of the zig! He said someone has messed with the machine - he got it finally to sewed in the middle position, which will be nice as I want the grandkids to be able to use this machine because it has a reverse, but it still won't zig zag. Still working on the machine! I don't give up easily on a machine!~
Nancy
If the needle goes back and forth to zig zag there might be a race stuck up with oil in the needle bar area - I've had that happen - a little heat from a blow dryer on that area might soften it up a bit (don't use heat if it's plastic)