"Butterfly" 15 clone?
 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/360493571443

The listing says antique but a little googling makes me think these are still being made. Anyone ever see one? Cool looking decals but I don't know anything about the machine itself.

I just looked at it. Isn't it a beauty? Would love to have it, just to sit there and enjoy its beautiful decals. Have never used a hand crank but would love to try. Have you? Sorry, I don't know anything about this machine.

I just googled it. Seems to be a new machine made in Japan. The company uses the term Singer/Butterfly. Their advertising implied (to me at least) that they are making and selling these new machines currently. Maybe one of our experts can tell us something about where the Singer names comes in on this Butterfly machine.

Looks new to me, and I see various sites with the same looking machine brand new made in China. I dont think this is an antique at all. But it still may sew okay.

you can search QB and find info about that machine.

I've pics of them as: hand cranks, treadle, and electric motor machines. The electric motor versions are set up with the same identical Alpha Sew parts Sew-Classic sells.

They are current manufacture and definitely not antiques. They are not even vintage.
Here is a link to Singer India showing these machines: { http://www.singerindia.net/Straight_Stich.aspx?id=1 }

I'd like to have one for my collection someday. They are very pretty.

Joe

Hi everyone - I just stumbled over this forum and wanted to offer my 2 cents, as I've been scouring the internet for vintage sewing machine info in the last couple of days and as I've always had a soft spot for these Singer clones.

Singer 15-clones (and indeed "proper" Singer 15s, as J Miler pointed out) have been made in India and in China since at least the 1940s/1950s and are still produced in innumerable factories. In China, they are known as "JA" domestic sewing machines. The JA-1 is the basic model, the JA-2 has reverse and the JA2-2 adds a cloth feed regulator.

One of the more known (and the original, I gather) Chinese factories is Butterfly in Shanghai - this is the reason why they are often generically referred to as "Butterflys". They are, however, sold with an amazing number of brand names (and you can probably have your own put on them, if you order a few). As noted, they exist in hand crank, treadle and electrified versions and are quite popular in Africa and in places around Asia, where their cheap price, "human power" and time-tested design are valued highly :)

Oh, wow! Thank you so much for all of the insights here (and everyone else as well.) Welcome to the board, BTW. I think the people here qualify as enablers but that's OK by me!

Since part of our goal is collecting pretty machines, even ones that we don't intend to use (though I want to rehab them all to where they _can_ be used) I'm going to work up an amount that I'll be willing to pay for this one. It sure is pretty!

Thank you very much - it does seem a treasure trove of knowledge :)

When assessing how much you would want to pay for the Butterfly, remember that the factory price on these Chinese JAs is around 20-25-30 $ for a new one.

True, but availability is worth something. In this case, though, it won't be an issue. We've decided that we're not going to go for this one - shipping machines in wooden cases has been a disappointment. Besides after today's haul we really need to concentrate on getting the ones we've got prettied up and running.