I will put my two cents in here about the cams. I picked up a 778 Touch and Sew a couple of weeks ago. It uses the black colored Top Hat type cams. Strange thing is, it has to have disk #0 in the machine to do a ZZ stitch. If it is not in there it will just sew a straight stitch. Mine didn't come with disk #0. It also uses the white colored Flexi Disks.
The other odd thing is, it had a smooth feed dog that was black. The black is because it is rubber. It was old, smooth and hard. Needless to say it no longer worked. It just slid on the fabric. I had to replace that one with an all metal one.
Next time I pick one up I will know to look at these two things as well as the gears.
One final thing on the gears. I recently read that the white gears were the original part. The black ones are the replacement part. So, if this is true, when you look at a machine and it has black gears in it, they were replaced. Can anyone confirm this?
Thanks.
~Grant~

Grant,

Over the years I have bought replacement gears from the wholesale house in both black and white. Most of the original gears that I have seen/ replaced were white (actually a ugly amber color).

Cathy

Thank you for clearing that up for me. I was a little skeptical about it myself.
p.s. I just picked up two more in the past few hours. A 600E and a 603E.
~G~

Grant,

You're welcome.
I love my 600E.

Cathy

We traded for a Singer T&S 778 last week with another forum member. The one we got had 90% of it's attachments and cams, we had enough in our stash to finish the set. The "0" cam was cracked but we had a spare. Bakelite will do that if it's dropped or twisted or you hold your mouth crooked.
Sew Classic has one in stock: { http://www.shop.sew-classic.com/Cam-...03A-171316.htm }.
The feed dogs were metal and work nicely. And the feed dog gears were black with the spiral cut. I don't know if there is different versions of the 778 but this one is a nice one. Everything works and it even makes duck patterns with one of the white cams.

Joe

My local shop had one so I picked it up yesterday. It is sewing perfectly now. I wound up bringing two more T&S machines home from his back room. A 600E and a 603E. The 603E is running again and I will be test sewing on it this morning. The 600E has a broken handwheel so I am not sure about that one. I have a lot of cams. I counted 20 of them and I have the duck pattern one too.
~G~

Only 20 cams?! I think I might have 40 or more. But then I have three machines that use them and I've been snagging any and all lots of slant shank accessories and most of them come with cams too.

Joe

Joe,

I have proof that those cams breed in dark garage. Way over a hundred cams is the proof.

Grant,

Send me a PM me. I probably have a spare hand wheel for an early T&S.

Cathy

Usually when I get a machine my rule of thumb is, what came with the machine goes with the machine. I have a few other cams but the top hat cams for the T&S machines that I have were a set that came in a box of sewing parts goodies I found at an estate sale. I have been waiting for a machine to pair them up with.
I do have a question about the T&S and the #0 plain ZZ cam. Do all T&S machines need that cam in to be able to do a ZZ stitch? Or do some have the ZZ built in. It seems odd to me that if you lose or break it, you won't be able to do a ZZ stitch.
~G~

Joe, I also have the duck cam. I tried it but it didn't look like a duck in either of my machines.
~G~