love this! will be great for my W&G and my 66... both of which i think would appreciate older wooden spools vs plastic. :)

Thanks for sharing this fantastic idea. Where there is a will there is a way. Will try this.

Love it! thank you! i like the look and feel of the wooden spools too, and i have a bunch of them. i'll try it.

Clever, clever. I use a late 40's early 50's Pinnock (Aussie brand so may be unknown to you). It has a side winding bobbin fill.....due to the different configuration it won't work for me, but will work a treat on my top winding machines. Thanks for posting.

I have a sneaking suspicion that the FWs won't need the spool springs as much anymore too... money saver! :)

BTW, if anyone's interested in the articles I found to tell me when the wood spools were discontinued, they're below. One article written fairly recently, and 2 newspaper articles. The newspaper articles are fun too, because of the other articles, and the "funnies".

http://www.interweave.com/needle/pro...n-Spools-1.pdf
http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...rontpage&hl=en - Page 6 by the funnies.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...rontpage&hl=en - Page 20

Hey Earthwalker,

I'd have to see it, but there's a chance the smaller spools would work. I think a 15 for instance should be able to do it, but haven't had a chance to try yet.

That said, you just need one machine that can do it and you're golden. :)

Now that I think about it, I should have put the word out that I was looking for spools before I published this. I suspect it's going to get harder to find them now. :shock:

The bobbin winder on my 15-91 is very close to the body once you push the bobbin winder in place. The only spool that wasn't too long was an very old spool of Belding Corticelli silk buttonhole and button thread. The spool is 5/8" tall x 1'wide and holds 10 yards. It's a really tight fit without any hook & loop tape.

They still make wood spools. I've seen them in the wood findings section of craft stores and websites. Pet stores also have bird toys with colored spools.

you bet they the wood spools are hard to find and a fair price ebay has some but there shipping is not fair, where would you find them . and what to look for hope to get real wood and not plastic when dealing on internet.

Darn! I was hoping that some of the black machines could do it. I'll try to come up wit a list of the machines that I have here that can squeeze a spool into the bobbin area. I guess that makes a case for a SideWinder for some people. I was hoping to avoid that.

The lovely lady at our favorite antique shop yesterday goes, "of course! I used to rewind the spools all the time on my Bernina..." I looked at her and thought: "You need to be posting on the Interwebs!!"

I was at Michaels yesterday too, and it didn't occur to me to look there.

It's even worse once you start to shop out of country too. There are a lot of times the product is worth the price, but they want 2 -3 times the price of the item for shipping. Ebay's been really bad for that lately, but Amazon is too.
The Antiques lady yesterday said go to the antiques shows. They're "cheap" there. The problem is, the next one is in a town 100 miles away, and then there's admission on top. I'd have to bring back a truckload full to make that worth it. ... On second thought. I'm OK with it. :D

I use an electric drill with a chopstick through the spool and rewind mine. There are wooden spools available from craft places, and I got some brand new ones in a batch of "seconds" for making parrot toys.
Carol V___Pa.