so for the bad news...
I was walking through the operation and noticed that there were two issues. One there was nothing keeping the stitch length control arm in place, and the stitch length knob screwed down onto nothing. Upon closer examination it is missing a "protuberance" on one end of the feed dog control arm.
Here is a picture of a complete one.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]387757[/ATTACH]
and the end of mine.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]387758[/ATTACH]
the screw under the stitch length knob has nothing to push on.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]387759[/ATTACH]
Now to figure out a "clever" way through this one...