It stitches.....Really it does

Once I had the motor running I decided it was time to clean up a machine.  Yesterday I just put the motor on a dirty machine and I did not "stitch it in" as the lingo goes.  I was just thrilled to see the needle go up and down.  I know.... I know.......But you know what I mean.  The motor worked, by golly and I fixed it.

So I spent all day on this machine.   All right, not ALL DAY.  But most of it.   It was pretty dirty and it, too , has really bad wiring.

I could have cleaned up the machine that the refurbished motor was on.  But, I was going to have to take the motor off to work on it so I decided to take the motor off of this machine,  clean it and put the refurb on it.  This machine is cosmetically challenged, as the saying goes.  It is a good practice machine.

This is what the motor wiring from this machine looks like.  EEEEEEUUUUUYYYYYYY   


BUT  I am so not intimidate by this. 

 I can fix that, no problem......

This is what the bottom of the machine looked like.  It had some old dried oil everywhere.  So I cleaned it up with some degreaser and some denatured alcohol.  Purely cosmetic.  I assure you.  I
Tri-flowed everywhere and put new grease on the gears.  It did help to have a copy of the service manual. 

I was working on the gears in the back of the machine and I noticed that there was a catch as I turned the handwheel.  After I greased these gears and turned the handwheel it was so much smoother.  What in the world had I done?  Who knows.... maybe there was some lint up under the bobbin case.  So I took that sucker out.  What an ordeal.  I followed the service manual..  Rain had done a tutorial on this and it is posted on Vintagesingers but I did not have my computer close at hand.  I am sure his way is easier.  Just the same, there was dirt but no lint and the problem did not get better with the bobbin case out.

I don't know how I noticed it, but somehow the thread cutter had gotten repositioned.......

 And it was binding up on the needle clamp......So I figured that out.  GEEZ, what a simple solution.

Well I needed to learn how to take out the bobbin case.  It was pretty dirty in there, yes it was.
I did not take out the hook.  I have done enough advanced stuff on this machine and as I have been told, 9 times out of 10 the machine is not out of time.  What would make it go out of time??????

I oiled and cleaned it and finally was ready to put the refurb on.  OOPs.  No foot pedal.  Oh, yeah, now I remember.....that foot pedal needed new wires.  The poor dogs were getting hungry, it was past dinner time and I showed no signs of letting up.  I got that foot pedal re-wired and new ring connectors soldered and then, dinner.

Add just enough grease to make the gears look wet. Anything more is plain wasteful.

I always wondered how much grease to put on gears.  Now I know.  I still don't understand why some Kenmores have so much grease, but according to the guru, Ray White, just enough to make them look wet.

Once I got it all connected, and I must admit I was pretty pleased with myself, I put the power to the machine.  First, I made sure that everything worked by hand.  The handwheel was a bit tight, but I thought that maybe it was due to the fact that it just hadn't gotten all the grease and oil where it needed to go.  But something was wrong.  I tried running the motor for a bit, but it would not pick up speed.  So, I spent the next hour trying to figure that out.  I sanded the inside of the handwheel,  I sanded the shaft  I ran the  motor without any load, just to be sure (I had done this yesterday but what the heck).  Finally I noticed the problem.....the bobbin winder was engaged.  OK so now I am dumb.  Maybe just tired.  Something is still not quite right.  I cannot get the stop motion knob to release so that the machine doesn't run when I am winding the bobbin...... Probably something simple.  I tried a million different configurations of the washer and stop motion knob.  Who knows.  I gave up.  I needed a drink.

 
I understand the appeal of this machine.  It is quiet and I think it makes a fairly decent stitch.  I want to try it on some thicker layers.  But that is for another day.  I'm beat.  It was a long day with lots of lessons learned.  But how the heck was I to know that the stupid bobbin winder was engaged?  Gee whizz.