New Machine!!
 

I've posted on here a couple of times about some problems I was having with my Brother Dreamweaver. The people I bought it from were useless, and some of the worst customer service I have ever experienced.

Brother was helpful but we still weren't able to solve my problems, and I was getting more and more frustrated - bobbin sensor wasn't working, when I was doing FMQ it would constantly get "stuck", thread was shredding no matter what I did, it was driving me bonkers.

I had been having these problems for almost a year, and the problems were starting to get worse. The fabric wasn't feeding properly through the machine, and it wouldn't sew over seams without me having to "tug" it through.

I told Brother in an email that I wanted another certified technician to look at my machine. I drove an hour away, explained everything to him and he started to laugh ... AH yes, you're one of "those" ... I must admit, my eyebrows went up about 6 inches. Before I had a chance to explain he says: "this is how your sales went ... you went in to the store told them what you wanted, and they showed you this machine. They told you that no matter how much sewing you did, this machine could handle it."

I agreed, and told him that I sew anywhere from 2-3 hours a day, and in the winter much more, and longer on the weekends.

He basically told me I had killed my machine. For the amount of sewing that you do (and most of it is FMQ), you should have bought a lower version and a long arm.

I was ticked (Ok, I was more than that LOL) .. to make a long story short, he replaced the feed dog unit on my machine (at their cost) I did have to pay for labour, and I paid for him to do a full / thorough maintenance / cleaning on my machine.

And since I wasn't about to stop quilting, and I can't afford to replace the feed dog unit every 2 years, I went out and bought the husqvarna platinum Q160

Setting this up was not fun LOL but I finally got it up and running ... and then I did some sewing and oh boy ... I feel like I am learning all over again!

I was so good at FMQ on my machine hahahahaha ... I can still do it, but I don't have all the bells and whistles (cutter, threader, etc) so the cheating and short cuts I did on my brother can't be done on this one. And it sews much faster!!!

Lots of practice coming up over the winter!

Oh how wonderful!! You're going to have a lot of fun with your new toy :)

Congrats! Looks like that's got Handi Quilter's new Insight table as well (will the built-in stitch regulation). (The Platinum is a rebadged HQ Sweet Sixteen so you can look to those groups for lots of info https://cdn.quiltingboard.com/images/smilies/smile.png )

Congratulations and enjoy your new machine. It is always fun to learn on a new machine and hopefully it will be nicer to you than the other machine.

Four of my sew group have the Dreamweaver. Two that do the embroidery quilting a lot have nothing but problems when they try to sew. They are less then a year old and already been in shop for problems. The other two don't sew or embroidery as much and their machines are fine. All four decided to trade in the machines for a lower tech model hoping not to lose too much of what they paid.

Congrats and enjoy!

Thanks all! Yes, it is the HandiQuilter technology ...

OnebyOne - your friends need to keep complaining to brother ... I drove them bonkers until I got what I wanted, and I'm glad I did ... (well, I'm not glad I forked out a ton of money for a new machine LOL) ... but at least I got the part replaced for free

I'm so glad that you have resolved your issues so successfully, oh the fun you and your new machine will have.

Isn't wonderful to have a repair person you can trust/connect on? My car repairman was a great guy. I have a great sewing machine guy now that is not the rep for my brand -- but that's ok, it's not on warranty and he can deal with it just fine and tell me the truth and still appreciate my vintage machine too.

We deserve quality tools. I'm looking at it now as that I spend more time with my sewing machine now than with my car which in addition to acquisition cost requires maintenance and repairs as well as gas, plus taxes and insurance. A long arm is really looking cheap to me in those terms, especially when I would definitely spend more time with my machine than my car...

Sorry about your brothers machine. An unfortunate lesson to have to learn. I am thrilled about your new machine. Once you learn all the bells and whistles you will be on your way to FMQ heaven!