OurWorkbench

James

James brought an interesting machine, labeled a Domestic, believed to have been made about 1906. It is a very small machine, the bed measuring 11 inches by 7-1/4 inches. The pillar is short, with a short harp space, measuring only 3-1/2 inches from the bed to the underside of the arm. It is noticeably smaller than a three-quarter size machine.

Pictures are shown here.






James also brought a piece of Arctic Seal leather, a very tough and unusual material that would be nice to make something needing to be very rugged.





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OurWorkbench

Lastly, James brought a shirt that he saw and liked at a thrift store. It is a patchwork of pieces sewn together, much like a quilt might be. Made by Jos. A Bank, pictures of the shirt are shown below.






Dorothy

Dorothy talked a little bit about her work and a 4-day sewing symposium she is attending via Zoom, focused on sewing undergarments.

She mentioned a Duerkopp-Adler industrial machine head that she acquired some time ago. She said that she'd like to bring it to a meeting sometime, but it is both bulky and heavy and has not done so yet.

John

John has taken interest over the last month in a unique and interesting thing called a Cornely chain stitch embroidery machine. Janey found and watched a video, which then caught John's interest. It is a highly complicated piece of machinery, which is steered via a hand crank underneath the bed of the machine. The entire stitching mechanism (both above and below) rotates with the crank. They are sort of rare and very expensive when found. John brought a picture of one for others to see. If a real one should appear, he'll bring that.




It is very similar to a Singer114w103, which is an almost identical embroidery machine. There is also a more modern equivalent, a machine called an Axis.

Pictures, most of which are copyrighted, may be easily found on the internet. There are a couple of videos of its use, although the operator is less than expert. They are listed below. The first shows its use from the topside. The second shows the use of the hand crank, located beneath the machine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fhVYOXM7PY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjxBNtWynEI


Dianne

Dianne contributed some notes and a picture of a project she has been working on. She writes:


Today I've been playing with the underbraider attachment on a Singer 201K hand crank made in 1958. What fun! Works like a charm, using cotton twine intended for cooking, as in tying up a turkey or whatever. There's a whole ball of this string......and I'm thinking that simple designs done this way will make a cute baby quilt.

The string experiment on the underbraider seems to be successful. The string gets firmly sewn down, and a bit flattened. If you didn't know, you might not figure out it was string. I sewed six quick 5" blocks, not aiming for symmetry or perfection - 'primitive' style. In one block the string crosses over itself, which worked mostly OK. All starting and ending points were at the edges, not knowing how to effectively start or end within the block. Then these were sashed and made into a placemat. Free motion quilting followed, close to one side of each string piece, which should help stabilize the little blocks, as the string is only attached to the top fabric. The question is: how will this launder? To be determined sometime this week. I'll let you know.

Dianne




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OurWorkbench

Leon

Leon, our member at large from Kansas, sent us some details of what he has been working on, along with several pictures. In his words:


Iris used her ( ugh) modern Singer Quantum Stylist 9960 a lot this month. She reupholstered a couch and a Morris chair. Her machine balked partially through the project so I got out my oil can and gave it some help. When she was done she said , "I think it is time for a serious clean and lube. It certainly reminded me why I love vintage machines. it is only 4 years old, but as I was trying to strip it of plastic, I was worried about breaking latches that I couldn't see or about stressing electrical connections all through it. It took me 15 minutes to get the faceplate off and it only had one screw. Nasty thing. I went to separate the sides undid screws, popped out latches and had it almost free. Under a screwed on access plate over the tensioner that was one last screw way under it. And all that had to be done just to access the belt. The machine needed love, but I was seething. Cleaning took forever because she had used it a lot, but I kept finding 3/8" pieces of thread. Oh yea. This has the marvelous cut your thread feature that dumps it into the body of the machine to drift with time and tide. This is a reason I rarely will touch plastic machines and would certainly not do it for profit. Anyway, some pics of the machine and it's innards.









Today Iris had cataract surgery (She did well) and I was left unattended. A garage sale was close. I behaved myself and didn't buy any of the 3 Singer 66s. Though the one in the rectangle case had appeal for the case and the spoked wheel.




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Leon also forwarded this from Iris.


Because my dog, Miss Jane Barkle, ate the couch and chair cushions, I had to recover them both. I accomplished this with my handy-dandy staple gun and my Singer Quantum Stylist 9960. I expected to need to use one of my old iron machines to get through the upholstery fabric, but the weight wasn't a problem and the modern computerized machine had no trouble making piping or sewing multiple layers of fabric together.








In Closing

At the end of our meeting, as we were ready to leave and pay, we saw something we hadn't seen before. It was a portable credit card checkout device given us by our server. They had several of them. They apparently connect by WiFi to the restaurant's system so that the credit card doesn't changes hands. Couldn't resist taking a picture of it.



We will meet again next month, as usual. We will post the notes of that meeting here.

OurWorkbench

News stories about COVID variants and increased transmissibility have people a bit uneasy. Enough people responded in their RSVP with concerns about in-person meetings that we decided, sort of at the last minute, to go back to virtual meetings for a while longer.

Fortunately, some of our members were able to get information and pictures of their work projects together and send them to us for posting.


Courtney

We'll begin with Courtney, who sends greetings from northern Colorado. Courtney has family in town and doesn't have anything for this month, but sent greetings to all. He writes:

I meant to get you something for this month, but I have been rather overwhelmed with my brother-in-law and his wife coming tomorrow. Sorry can't participate this month. I'll be back next month however.

Thanks for all your work on getting things set up.

Courtney



Dorothy

Hello!

I rearranged my sewing room ( it is tiny) to access my Necchi SuperNova Automatica. (Side benefit- I found the missing shorts pattern my Son likes, organized boxes according to fabric type, cut- better sew it up items, and found the machine apron so I can serge, catch thread and have my nippers plus chalk in pockets not falling on the floor!)

The SuperNova was the first purchase of a Vintage Machine after a Featherweight. It was in the original cabinet, no cords, and no accessories. The lift assist is absolutely a Joy! It makes it so easy to get the heavy little beast into sew position!

I may say this about most of my machines, but it is my favorite Mid Century CAM machine.

I am sewing with knits, both cotton and synthetic based with ease. A Ball Point needle works nicely.

I have purchased cord (with foot pedal) and accessories. One kit with pre-assembled cams & feet plus a box of assemble your own cams additional experimenting with stitch patterns. There are roughly 46 diagrams for specific patterns on the box with many more options to experiment with. Beautiful stitches, including the 3 step zig zag for elastic!

Thank You!
Dorothy

FYI. Janey- seems vintage apron patterns are really in Vogue right now with lots of offerings and many people looking for specific styles.












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OurWorkbench

Thanh

Thanh is our newest member. We had an opportunity to meet him at last month's in-person meetings. It was a pleasure to be able to meet him and we welcome him to our group.

Thanh sent a short write-up about what he has been doing over the last month:

I'm cleaning my Davis VF2 dated ~1901/1902. When I bought the sewing machine, the needle moved freely up and down but the foot didn't advance. So I'm in the middle of cleaning it and trying to free it up. Here are some before pictures and one picture post cleaning. The lever that pushes the need bar is partially unfrozen but needs another day to let the oil soak in. I also still need to clean the half that came off with the face plate. Luckily nothing is frozen there; it just needs a good cleaning.

I saw a video on how to remove the faceplate by leaning the machine on the handwheel so parts don't pop out during disassembly. It wasn't as daunting as it sounds and the faceplate with all the parts came out without much trouble.

Regards,

Thanh









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Thanh followed up in another email with a little bit about what his wife has been working on:

I would like to add an update on my wife’s current project. She is taking an old ACME adjustable dress form and creating a custom sized one. She’s pretty artistic and started to decoupage the form before adding the batting. I think it looks really nice like it is now but unfortunately she’ll have to cover it up to right size it.







Janey

Janey has obtained several attachments for her back clamping 66-1. She has spent considerable time trying to identify the various pieces to go with which sets. In her words:

I have most recently received several back clamp attachments from Joe. When I received them I realized that there were other feet that went with the early rufflers that I was unaware of. While I had a later underbraider, I didn't have a quilting foot to use with it. One of the feet that I got looked like it might work as it was short and could slide the hemmers and binder in. Knowing that Ericka would know about them, I reached out to her, to find out some more about the different types of back clamp feet. She has been extremely helpful to me. I was able to get the needed quilter foot and the quilting bar for the attachment foot (early slide in) and narrow hemmer from her.

Between Ericka and Needlebar (mostly from Ericka), it appears that there were 5 rufflers that were for the 66-1. Actually the first two are basically the same, but one is plain and the other has Singer 66 stamped on it. It appears that the plain one came with the shirr plate and underbraider that did not have the screw attached. The plates that I got from Joe have the screw actually attached to them, which is nice. I now have three of the different types. There are three tuckers (I only have 2) and three binders that were made for the back clamp 66-1/66-3 machines. I didn't realize how many attachments that I actually have now.


I also got a Fashion Aids Case blue bag sans string from Ericka. I thought I was going to have to undo some stitches to be able to thread a drawstring, as the seam stitches were into the casing. Even a small safety pin would not fit, so wondered how I would thread it as the casing didn't have two openings. I had some twine that was too thick but was able to separate so that it was thinner. I used a floss threader to get it threaded. That was a somewhat tedious job. I only stuck the threader through the fabric once. It took a couple of trys to get it past the bend on the opposite side from seam opening of the casing.





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Leon, from Kansas, sent what he has been up to on the sewing machine front.

Leon

Pretty quiet on the sewing machine front in Kansas. Got some sadish news. The Ks museum of history will have remodel soon.
Alas, they will be closed on Ks day. We usually take our handcranks there and have 1,400 kids try them out. A great day of fun.

Oh well. Still working on the 5 machines I bought last month. The most interesting is a Wilson (not Wheeler Wilson) vibrating shuttle with a Hamilton Beach swing away motor. I had Iris jump on the 'puter to find out info on it as I started oiling it. NADA. hmm more checking to do . Has some serious White tendencies, but not the tension area. Oh well pictures of it follow.










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Later, in a second email, Leon sent more:

Got this 534 back into action. I was surprised to see a coin slot for the light cover instead of a conventional screwdriver slot. I was more surprised to see a mud dauber nest on the bottom access plate.









In Closing

We will post here again next month. We appreciate our small growing readership. Thank you for reading.

bkay

[QUOTE=OurWorkbench;850714

We will post here again next month. We appreciate our small growing readership. Thank you for reading.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for sharing.
bkay