What began as a chilly and rainy morning, changed to blue sky and sunshine by the time we were meeting at Perkins. Our monthly sewing machine get together met at ten o'clock and had as many people attending as we have ever had.
We welcomed a new person named Dawn, joining us for the first time. She brought a Bel-Air 600, made in occupied Japan. It does need to be rewired. It had a bag of attachments, some of which were unfamiliar to her, as to their function. Janey and Dorothy went through them with her as to what they were. With only a little rust in a few places, the Bel-Air should restore nicely and work fine. We talked about rust removers, polishes and oils, among other things. A picture of her machine is shown below.
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Also at our get together were Courtney, Dianne, Cheryl & Chris, Dorothy, Carol, Paula, Janey & John. Ten of us in all.
As a surprise, Dorothy made some much appreciated and well received sewing machine carriers for everyone who attended. There was some talk about the plans for it at the last meeting, but Dorothy arrived with several of them already made.
Each carrier has a tough fabric bottom, with heavy duty straps to hold a machine safely, and providing a handle for carrying it easily. It's a great design. If anyone has ever had the handle of a case top come loose, this is the thing to prevent that. Just about any machine in a portable case can be carried safely and with ease. Thank you Dorothy.
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Dianne brought an interesting antique toy machine made of wood. She emailed us a few days ago that she would be bringing a wooden sewing machine and it had some of us looking up on the internet what it could possibly be.
It features a ring shaped wooden body with metal moving parts. It is a chain stitch machine and has a section of the ring which is removable to allow fabric to be more easily pulled through the very small machine. The name of the machine is a Practical. According to
https://sewalot.com/foley%20&%20williams%20goodrich.htm and
http://needlebar.org/nbwiki/index.php/Goodrich it is a Foley & Williams machine.
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Courtney brought an interesting metal sculpture of a man sitting at a sewing machine, the man being formed from a bent railroad spike with other metal pieces being used to form a table and sewing machine. Thread was made from wire.
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Courtney also brought a tote his wife had given him with a Willcox & Gibbs printed on it.
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There was an industrial bobbin winder that Carol brought which is shown above with Dorothy's carrier. Dorothy, our resident industrial guru, told us that bobbin winders were specific to the various machines. Carol's appears to be for such machines as 35-1, 78-1, 111W100 and 151W6.
Paula brought a picture of an interesting drop-at-a-time oiling pen. It was one her phone. Sorry, no picture.
John talked to Chris and Cheryl about the wiring of a Montgomery Wards machine that Janey got this month. It has a "Chicago" plug on the rear of the pillar, believed to be a power connection, but is a socket. This would mean that the power cord would have pins- posing a safety hazard. We will have to determine the wiring design with a meter, but may be looking for a plug for it. We talked about the possibility of making a plug, with two soldered metal pins and set in potting compound for an insulated plug body.
Courtney and John talked a little bit more about a computer sewing machine controller that Courtney is working on.
I'm sure there were things talked about that were missed here. But these, at least, were the highlights of the meeting.
We plan to meet again next month and will post the minutes of the next meeting here.