Nancy, the vintage yahoo groups are wonderful treasure troves of info. Most vintage machines are prone to have some sort of issue or issues and the specific vintage yahoo group usually has many postings on that specific problem and many times, how to's with photos to show how to do it. My Viking problems were rather tough and Bill Holman was kind enough to answer some questions and help guide me through it. One major issue for the vintage Vikings is that similarly to certain
Elna models, they have problems if not used frequently. They lock up internally and the dials freeze. People try to force the dials and get the buttonholer out of whack which causes the machine to operate in reverse only. Many times vintage Vikings will only operate in reverse and there are several reasons why. My machine had all 3 problems:> So, it was a good one to learn on!
Yes, I tackle all kinds of construction jobs. My reason is not necessarily to save money, although that's nice. But, I'm a perfectionist, and I just am never satisfied with jobs other men do. They seem to think good enough is passable and I want it done right and as close to perfect as possible. So...I tend to try to do things myself.
Nancy, I bet you will do more digging and learn more, when you happen to buy machines that will be way too expensive to fix (by someone else). I'll have to find you some of those. Hehehe.