Originally Posted by
juliasb
You definitely have your work cut out with this new haul! I have to ask how long do you think it will take to overhaul all these priceless machines. Then what will you do with all of them once they are restored? Do you keep them or sell them. I personally would be hard pressed to sell any of them as I tend to be a collector. Have loads of fun tinkering.
I think it will take months. Generally, I clean the machine as much as I can, test it, then make a base for it to sit in. In this situation I had actually been looking for some beat up 66s with the 9 spoke hand wheels, to use on other machines for hand cranks. I can get aftermarket hand wheels, for about $19, but they aren’t as high quality and I just prefer the idea of having a genuine Singer hand wheel. When I saw this lot of machines for the price they were, I couldn’t pass it up, and it gave me an excuse to drive almost 10hrs to visit my sister.
What will I do with these machines? I have a local sewing machine friend who is more connected with other sewing machine people, so I will check with her on anyone who might be interested (for not much money probably) in the Singer fiddle base and the two White vibrating shuttle machines; I think I have the shuttles for all three of these machines, and attachments for the Whites, which should make it easier. I just don’t know anything about these particular machines. I won’t clean or service any of them until I know one way or the other.
The Touch & Sew I will check for intact gears, if they are intact then I will service it and sell it on craigslist for $5; if not then I will try to scavenge parts from it and recycle the rest. The Kenmore 117.959 I will clean up and service. I’ve had three other 117 series Kenmores, and I like them, and right now I have an empty Kenmore table in which I can store this one, or I’ll make a case for it and sell it. The blue/white White I’ve already tested, but not serviced, and it sews just fine, although something was supposed to be wrong with it, just not sure what the problem was supposed to be.
The 27s, I’m not sure. They are treadle only, no rail/boss to handle a motor or hand crank. I do have a really cool motor mount for Singers which clamps to the back using the hole at the back top of the pillar, so I may keep those. If nothing else I will clean them up and test sew them by hand. Apparently the 27 with the Persian decals is not too common.
The 66s, I think three of them have good enough decals to clean up and service and then turn into hand cranks after I make some bases for them, and then try to sell. The other two will be donor machines as necessary, and if I have enough parts I will hopefully make them work and make bases for them with hand cranks, they just won’t be as pretty.
The more time I put into a machine, the harder it is to part with it, but I don’t have a lot of storage room so I have to say goodbye to some of them. When I try to sell, I am really only looking to get back actual $$ I have in them, my labor does not add any value in terms of sale price. I only sell on craigslist, I am not on facebook. This is probably more than you wanted to know, but there it is!