Need a second opinion,... or a second set of arms to...
#12
Banned
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: San Lorenzo, CA
Posts: 5,361
#13
My co-workers knew when I found the "solution" (usually something exceedingly non-sensical) when I'd grab my head and moan "Owww! My Eye!!!" (for the stabbing headache that originates right behind the eye, practically blinding you.) As always, I had to train on the process change then field the "WTH were they thinking?" questions.
Uh,... I'm just the messenger!
Come to think of it, I think I had that same headache yesterday...
#14
Power Poster
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: Somewhere
Posts: 15,506
In 3 days of fairly solid fighting, I did NOT bond with that machine at all! Too many things seemed needlessly complex for the sake of... probably patents or avoiding patents? The top tensioner kept snapping my thread as I was trying to thread the machine because of a really bizarre design (and Aurifil thread which is thin to begin with), the pins to "hold" the hook seemed entirely unnecessary and in fact are on most other class 15 type machines (though this is more like a 115 - rotary and all...), the bobbin case is fiddly, and that needlebar hitting the foot if the foot is up when trying to bring the bobbin thread up or checking things like timing made me consider trying to heave it out the window that's at eye height in my studio.
#15
The first one - a class 15 clone - was before I sewed (well) - it was tuned up by an army seamster and pronounced a lovely machine. At the time, I thought it was bunk. It didn't sew any better than my 290C. I later - after I donated it to a rescue society and learned to sew a few years after that - came to learn that it was possibly a machine I would have loved. If I were to ever come across that baby blue clone again, I'd grab it in a heartbeat.
Then I had one that was likely somewhere in the late 60s to late 70s era. It cleaned up fine and sewed beautifully. Didn't really spend a lot of time bonding with it but had no complaints at all with it. The gal I gave it to had the presser foot lever fall off though. That was a screw I'd never thought to check before then! I fixed it for her the next time I saw her. To the best of my knowledge, she's still using it a few years later.
All of the Kenmores - as I usually mention in other threads - have never given me issues. Though the most common ones I deal with are the Maruzen/Jaguar and Janome machines. Though like the other Kenmore machines, I find for some reason that those Whites didn't really want to reveal their personalities to me. Still, I'll take an understated personality over a bad attitude any day.
This is the oldest White I've dealt with here, the most abused White and the most belligerent White I've dealt with (discounting of course my probably poor treatment of the clone!) I can see if the machine had been well maintained that its "isms" would have been a lot more tolerable and I would have been a lot more tolerant of it if I had found that bushing earlier. I do think also that, if I were just sewing on it - not servicing - I would also be less critical of it. I find that of a few of the brands.
I also find that as I'm getting older, I am really appreciating "simple and just works" a lot more. I'm not quite ready to make the drastic changes - a mac, an automatic car, etc. - but I sure can appreciate why people do it.
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