Too much oil?
 

I was given a Singer 401, as I said I would try and fix it..The main problem is it runs very slow. Well, I thought it just needed to be cleaned up as the last owner had poured oil over the whole machine. !!!? Well, I cleaned and wiped for ever!?!? Then oiled and lubed and tested it---;it still ran slow. So thought it must be the motor (I don't know anything about motors?) But I got it apart where I could see inside it.. Then ran it and where wheel turns it was causing sparks and got warm and smoked a little... so stopped. Is the motor bad??? or is it fixable??? I hope I have explained it good enough. I just need a thumbs up or down!!!!?!?!? Thank you great people!!

I'll give you 10 thumbs up for trying! Gurus will be along shortly I'm sure.

Remove the motor and clean all the oil out of it. I've never heard of one of these motors smoking/sparking.

Cari

I opened up and cleaned an old Elna Supermatic a few weeks a go. The inner base of the machine were soaked with oil, thick layer of sticky goo as a result of previous over oiling. The gears were dry and grimy, very slow running and sticky machine until I had a couple of rounds with cleaning and oiling. So, yes, too much oil is not uncommon, and yet no oil in other places on the same machine. I hope you manage to sort out the motor.

401s are not the fastest running machines but they should run at a reasonable speed. I would suggest using denatured alcohol and cleaning everything that moves internally. Then clean the oil out of the motor. If you don't want to disassemble it, get some electronic equipment cleaner and hose it out. Pull the brushes and springs if they come out and clean them too.

Then put it back together and oil it properly. Don't forget to grease the gears too. The owners manual has instructions on where to oil and grease, so if you didn't get one Singer has free downloads.

Joe

Open up the bobbin area and put a drop of oil between the bobbin race and the 'floor' those get dry and don't like to move. If it still doesn't work oil parts under that. To see if it is the motor put it on bobbin winder mode and see how it goes.

I used some alcohol on a q tip and rubbed it on the wheel and all the places I could reach. Then I ran it for a little bit. It did speed up pretty good, but it also started to really spark alot. So I got scared and stopped!!! So it is the motor that is the problem.. I guess it is shot????? Thanks everyone, sure wish I could have fixed it....

What could be wrong with the motor then? Can it be taken appart, checked and cleaned up? It's often wiring or condensers that act up when they get old. I had a 99K blew up on me, with bang and smoke, it gave me bit of a shock. After the blow up it blew fuse after few when I plugged it in. I eventually handed it in for repair and rewiring and it came back working fine, has ever since. It might be something repairable. The 401 model is very easily underestimated, it's not very pretty but sews up a storm. It's very well built with all metal gears, all I look I look for in a vintage machine. If you spend a bit of time, money and effort on it, it's one of those thing you never regret later on. It will serve you loyally ever after.

You need to take the motor out of the machine and clean it. You said someone really over oiled the machine, I'm willing to bet they got oil into the motor where it doesn't belong.

Cari

Check the foot controller which go out of tune after 60 years. If you have a good spare, try it out. If not, you could make sure the copper bridge is making contact with both contacts (it's obvious what I mean if you look inside the FC, or Google it).

If the FC is okay it's easy to rule the motor out next. Just undo the stop motion screw and see if the motor will run at full speed.

If you rule the motor out, turn it over by hand and see if it feels stiff.

If it does, you can find the problem quickly enough by turning it slowly while watching each part move.

If it's consistently slow and not the foot controller, it's likely just in need of oil (somewhere it wasn't soaked).