Singer 101 - My x01 Straight Is Complete

So even though I was traveling most of last year doesn't mean I wasn't still picking up the odd bit of sewing machine coolness on the way.

This is one of two 101s that I picked up from a friend on Victoria Sweatshop, Miriam in Indianapolis,  while driving through on one of my trips back west last year.  From the year, I'm guessing it's a 101-4.  I haven't done a lot of research on the 101s so don't take my word for it.

Both machines came in Library Tables.  I put the 1930 head in the 1923 table because it is in better shape and I like the older style table.

I stored both heads in the house over the winter and it's warm enough now that I decided to give them a check run today.  There were issues, but hey, the light works.

Nothing really major.  The stuck presser bar was fixed with a bit of Singer oil, a hammer and a punch. 

The finish was in really good shape.  A little oil on a cloth to get the dust off and it was shining nicely.

The bottom side was looking really good as well.  It should since it's enclosed.  Kind of puts a crimp in the mechanicals porn.

The wiring is kind of funky.  I'm pretty sure it's original.  Long tails that hang loose from the machine then are connected to a standard Singer 3 prong plug.  (I didn't take a picture of it).  It's like the wiring of the thing was an afterthought.

Having it tilted up did give me a chance to double check the serial number.  I prefer them on the top of the bed myself.

For as good looking at it is, it ran like a dog, a dead dog, a dead dog that had decomposed to dust.  Maybe a stitch every two seconds running flat out.

Since I was really wanting to check out the mechanicals I went ahead and pulled the bed off.  Helpful tip: If you want to take the bed off, unscrew and remove the spool pin that feeds the bobbin winder.  Trust me.

With the bed off I was surprised to see how pristine the oil wicks were.

Like really pristine.  Like has never had a drop of oil on them pristine.  The whole bottom end was dry.  That was corrected as well, using period correct oil of course.

Each wick got two drops and then the pan got four drops to be sucked up between them.  The oil ports in the arm were all given two drops and the head mechanisms were all taken care of as well.

Then it was time to get rid of the dust bunnies.  I really hadn't planned on doing any maintenance, but once I had the bed off I just took the opportunity to clean out the hook area and remove the feed dogs to get down deep.  The hook race was also given a drop of oil.

After working in the oil the machine freed up a lot.  It's still not doing 1000+ stitches a minute, but it's moving respectably well for a 90 year old machine.  It was time to do some stitches.

Thre results were underwhelming.  Tension was an issue at the start.  The stitch regulator is a little finicky above 10 per inch. Finally the stitches themselves were not very good.  No where near a 15 or 201.  There were wobbles galore and some stitches just looked looser than others.  Overall it performed about as well as a 66 in stitching, almost as bad as a modern machine.   Of course who knows how long it sat unused and what else might be slowly working itself back into shape.  I'll keep trying and playing with the tension to see what comes of it.

I'll also be doing a post for the 1923 in the next few days.  It won't be as in depth, it has some real issues that need to be fixed before it's ready to sew.

Thanks fo- oh! wait a second.  Yeah, the whole reason anyone reads posts about 101s...

Round Potted Motor! And Tube Mounted Singer Light!  Woohoo!