cashs_mom

My mother made saddle pads and mended horse blankets on my grandmother's old treadle. She said that it would sew anything that you could get under the foot. She had better luck with the treadle on heavy stuff than her 301

elnan

My vote is with Quilted Sunshine for the Pfaff 130. I also use my 301 slant for just about everything. I have read many of Quilted Sunshine's posts and would trust her opinion on any sewing machine. I feel that a Singer 237 is a decent machine, but would not depend on it for heavy duty work over the long term. When I first began to ready my Pfaff 30 for sewing, I often did searches and ended up at a site that advertised they would take all the Pfaff 130 machines they could get their hands on, as they were always in demand.

quiltingshorttimer

Not sure what you are sewing or if it's something that you will be enough of that you want to invest in a commercial industrial machine. I have an old Consew that my son bought to do car seat covers--then got married and needed the cash instead! So bought it--was already at my house and weights a bundle, but I can sew ANYTHING on it--layers of denim, leather, canvas, vinyl, etc. uses cones of thread, commerical needles and is truly a tank. Have made bags that have a 1/4" foam interfacing sandwiched between canvas and doubled. it only sew straight stitch, has a reverse, once the motor on, you have to push the treadle a bit to engage the clutch that makes it easy to raise the presser foot. he paid about $600 for it--but that was 10 yrs ago so you might be able to find something cheaper.

SusieQOH

I have a Juki TL2010Q and a Singer 201. They can both handle a lot.
However, I agree with the poster who said Ebay sellers call the old Singers "heavy duty".
They are powerful for sure but not what I would call heavy duty, as they would have you think.
I don't think they were made for leather and things like that. I could be wrong here though.

Bree123

I have a Singer 353 and it has no problem sewing through just about anything-- 3 layers of heavyweight denim, vinyl, drapery fabric ... things my Bernina 350 could never handle.

Feathers-N-Fur

I'm not the person you were asking, but will tell you I have a Juki F-600 and had no problems at all making my 2 Bionic Gear Bags. It didn't like heavy leather, but has sewn anything else I've ask, canvas, light weight leather, many layers of denim.

Bobbielinks

I had a Singer 301 years ago that sewed through anything. I loved it when patching bluejeans for hubby and sons. Don't know why I ever let it get away from me. Sure wish I had it now.