Black Swan And The Sounds Of Silence

Black Swan is purring like a kitten now.  But it wasn't easy.

A little backstory.  When I bought her, she had a broken needle.  I had just assumed that sometime during the years of neglect something came along and randomly snapped it off.  I assumed wrong.

But first there was also a user created problem.  Last night I just ran paper practice targets though her.  This morning I actually loaded her up with thread.  And... no stitches.  The hook turned, the needle went in an out, just the threads were not locking.  I was bummed.  Something was seriously wrong with the machine.  I KNEW! I had done everything correctly.  Well I hadn't.  In my excitement I had managed to put the needle in backwards.  D'oh!  Once that was resolved, with much blushing, the stitches came out just the way they are supposed to.

Treadle 201

It's like Ed 209 from Robocop, but way cooler.

201 Cleaned Up

Well it took just over two days, but here she is.  All clean, new grease and oil.  Just got an eight amp electrical cord for the pedal I'm going to put on and then give her a few revs to get the lubrication flowing.

It Followed Me Home, Honest. Can I Keep It!?

So I stumbled (while digging maniacally) across a little treasure today.

Taking Out The 66 Needle Bar Cap

After spending the evening pining over some 201's for sale that I can't let myself buy until I show progress on the 66 rebuild I decided to take out some frustrations on it. Specifically the needle bar cap, which has stubbornly refused to budge even after repeated drenchings of Blaster PB.

End Of The De-rusting Phase

I finished with the Evaporust yesterday.  I admit my expectations are probably a bit high.  But since I spent more on the Evaporust than I did the actual machine I'm de-rusting I figured I'm allowed.  Just to be fair though, for folks out there who might not be expecting miracles, here's what the bobbin winder looks like before and after Evaporust only treatment.

66 Derusting Begins

With the 15-30 put back together I had a tray's worth of Evaporust just laying about.  So it begins.  Still don't have a plan for the repainting; it's getting cold in Connecticut and I don't have a proper indoor painting space identified yet.  Also I'm waffling on what to do for decals.  My options are:  Wait till I'm back in Oklahoma next summer and see if a printing company a friend owns can handle it, print the waterslides myself on a cheesy laserjet (not very likely), order a set of the mixed reviewed waterslide decals that are on the expensive side or buy a set of NOS Chinese decals.  The last option would be the right one except the Chinese decals I've seen for sale are only Sphinx or Seagull style.  I have yet to see NOS Filigree. Decisions, decisions.  I'm leaning towards the Chinese Sphinx. Maybe.

Oh yeah came this close (' ') to buying a 1200 last night.  It was beat to death and even though it is basically a 201 with an presser foot mod I just couldn't see paying a hundred bucks (or 70 quid) for another machine that isn't exactly what I want and that needs restoration when I have the 66 in pieces and the 15-30 on deck.  Still keeping my eye out for a later 201-1 though.  I would love to have a machine with reverse on the treadle. 

Here's the Evaporust doing it's thing on the first batch.

A Little Cleaning on the 15-30

I've been using the treadle pretty constantly.  It gave me a chance to really get annoyed with how dirty I'm leaving it.  Yesterday I decided that as a test of how I'm going to do the cleaning for the 66 I should do a pre-run with the 15-30.  Made sense at the time.

I didn't do a complete breakdown on it.  Just the bobbin area, the face plate, oil cover and bobbin winder were what I started with.  Here's the before picture of the parts I expected to see the biggest change in.

The Herd

I've been doing underquilts for our hammocks today.  Insultex and 1.1oz ripstop are pretty annoying to work with so I decided to take a bit of a break and post photos of the machines.  The 66 is still in pieces and the treadle 15 is in the last post so I'll skip them.  Here are the rest.

The Sew-Maid.  A Japanese reproduction of a Singer 99.  I call her "Imouto-san" (Little Sister).  It was old when I got it in the 80's but I don't have a year on it.  It's a solid sewing machine  I've done tons of work on it.  Would even go back to it instead of using the 328K at times just because I can trust it to do a dead straight stitch.  Boxed up with everything it comes in at 19lbs.

This one is the wife's.  A Singer Sewhandy 50D.  When someone talks about their Featherweight I imagine them paying a couple hundred dollars for this.

Next up is the 328K.  We have two of these.  Each of us had one before we got married.  Not sure whose this one is.  The second one is in storage or lost in a move somewhere along the line.  It's a workhorse.  The only two complaints I have about it are that it will never do a truly straight stitch and it requires more pampering that all the other machines combined.

And now the 403A.  I got a deal on this one because the zigzag and the needle position selector weren't working.  Took some doing (I had never worked on a zigzag machine before) but after a day of wrestling with, including a retaining clip shooting across the room at one point, it decided to zigzag and let me set the needle.  It has pretty much replaced the 328K as my primary zigzag machine.  Doesn't see constant use though, just not perfect on straight stitches and a little on the loud side.

And finally The Wicked Queen, Grimhilda.  The 15-91.  Even though she's cruel and tortures me at every turn I can't help but love her.  Since I bought her I have done two tops for the wife and three camping hammocks, about a hundred yards worth of stitching.  I keep her on 12 stitches an inch so that's right around 45,000 stitches and not a single miss. The only mistakes are when she punishes me for not giving her my undivided attention.  I bought her from a Goodwill auction for $50, including a bentwood case.  I was expecting a project machine to rebuild.  I was stunned when I unwrapped the box and she still had a receipt and test stitch cloth on the bed from the last time she was serviced in the 1970's.  Other than a quick oiling I did nothing.  She looks like a museum piece.  She's in the cabinet that the 66 came in right now.  I toyed with the idea of converting her to use on the treadle, but it just seems wrong to take a drill her and tap a hole for a belt drive.

Addition to the quiver

So I use the machines to making camping gear. One problem I was running into was control at low speed, just a couple of stitches per second. With the 15-91 and 403 I tend to get a little heavy on the foot pedal after a few seconds and start racing. Well to fix that, today I picked up at 1915 treadle model 15. Sweet.

It took about 8 hours of work to chase away all the spiders that had moved in, give it a good cleaning and oiling.  Lots of rust on the working parts had to be worked off.  Yeah the rope-drive isn't period correct.  But why spend 20 bucks for a leather belt when 15 cents worth of Home Depot rope does the same trick.  No slips yet.  Sews solid, holds tension and stitch length perfect so far.

Adjustable Hemmer Foot Demo

Did a quick video for the adjustable hemmer foot I've been messing around with in my quest to make DIY hiking gear.

When worlds collide

Picked up the Evapo-Rust this morning.  Getting my plan of attack together for the cleaning that's next on the agenda.  Besides sewing machines I also tinker around with my motorcycle.  I decided to combine the two and here's what I came up with