Originally Posted by Terri D.

I can sort of tell when my machine needs a bit of oil, because it begins to sound a little too noisy. I also clean and oil it after finishing a project, and if I'm sewing with flannel or doing some serious piecing, I vacuum quite frequently throughout the project to avoid excessive lint buildup. You can do intermediate maintenance yourself, but, like taking babies to a pediatrician for their annual check up, the same thing applies to your sewing machine baby. The Bernina tech in my area says if you're taking good care of it in between service checks by him, every 18 months should be good, unless the machine is getting some seriously heavy use, then he recommends once a year.