Glenn

purplefiend

[vintagemotif]Vintagemotif,
My oldest Singer treadle is very quiet and smooth. The Elgin treadle irons were made by Free and have ball bearings in them, I've heard that's why its so smooth and quiet. If you take the Singer irons apart, clean and oil them they will get
quieter.
I just haven't quite figured out how to take the metal straight leg Singer irons apart to do that. I hate the clanking.
I'm hoping that someone at the North Texas TOGA next month will help me do just that.
Sharon

vintagemotif

I have a straight leg Singer too. I found it to be a bit noisy until I moved it against a wall and now the National Two Spools sits in it. Just moving it helped with some of the noise.

kwendt

Great! It'll come out the oven in about 20 minutes. The porch light is on...and oh yes, it's about 73 degrees, clear. The wind's out of the SE at about 2 mph. Perfect for a boat ride... Anyone else in for banana bread, coffee and a night time boat ride? Ahhhhhh....

KK

I have a problem - I have a White 1505. I know it's not a vintage, but wonder if you could help me. I have the corner of the quilt I am putting the binding on, and my needle is stuck half way down. I can not get it to go up or down so the quilt corner is stuck under the needle. How do I get the needle to move so I can get the quilt out??
I have loosened the needle, the foot, taken the bobbin out. But still have the problem. Do I have to cut off the corner of the quilt to get it out????? Thanks for any info you can give me. KK
It also squeals when I sew - is there a belt inside that needs to be replaced??

kwendt

wow. I'd carefully (using goggles for eye protection) cut that needle in half with a pair of heafty wire cutters. Then work the cloth/needle parts out from under the machine area. Re assess how/if it's stuck in the quilt. Use a seam ripper to clip the sewing threads, use plyers to pull both needle halves out of where they are. If the quilt cloth has been sucked down into the machine needle plate, you'll have to take the needle plate off the machine I guess ... to get it out without tearing it. There should be a way. Sacrifice the needle.

As far as why the machine did this... the resident experts can tell you more.
Could be that your needle is dull, needed changing.
But it sounds as if the machine is struggling to sew the binding on, because it's too many layers of thicknesses... hence the freezing/heavy work sounding of the motor. I wouldn't want to try to do that again with that particular machine...it's over working the motor, could cause it to be damaged. Again... that's just my opinion. Usually, when you run across a patch of heavier than normal sewing, and the machine starts to over work itself... it's best to stop trying to sew normally. Instead, (and I apologise if this is a tip you are already familier with) instead, turn the wheel on the side of the machine over by hand, sewing the problem few stitches by 'hand crank' turning the wheel manually. Once the patch of heavy work has been carefully hand sewn, the commence with normal sewing.

Some of the newer, non metal machines use a bunch of plastic parts. They are cheaper machines, to be sure... but they also are not up to the task of sewing through 7 or more layers of clothing (double folded bias binding alone is 4 layers, the quilt top/back and batting is 3, plus any seam allowances/corners you run across add 2 more layers.) That is a lot to sew, for a basic machine such as that model White.

Grandmother23

OK, I'll bite. What is a straight leg Singer Iron?

Grandmother23

You are wrong for this! I am a lover of water and fishing and eating, it doesn't matter where the water is, not too particular what the food is, etc. :lol:

kwendt

On those Elgin's.... what type of machine heads go into those ball bearing iron cabinets? Or perhaps the better question is, what machines will fit into the cabinet? Will full sized Singers (for example) fit the Elgin cabinets? I'm wondering if the Elgin's had VS machines in them, if the noise from the VS was just as loud as say a quieter Singer top load round bobbin, in a Singer (non ball bearing) cabinet. What's the quietest, smoothest combo?

Thoughs?

kwendt

Heck, girl! If you can come down here to South Florida and find the kinda 'bargains' on machines for me here... that you find in your travels up north... I'll GIVE you a huge slice of warm, fresh banana bread with real, dairy made, non-processed butter - a thermos of hot coffee - and take you and your boy(s) on the boat for DAYS! lol!!!! :mrgreen: Wanna wake board? Um... fishing is good too, need license. Wahoo, snook, tuna, snapper, tilapia... the local 5 star marina we love, has the BEST Grouper Dogs on the planet. Fresh off the boats!