Vintagesingers

I want to thank the folk at vintagesingers yahoo group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vintagesingers) for advising me that this spew could be from a bobbin winder tire. See? It is the same color.  It is nice to have access to this group and a very generous group of knowledgeable people.

I also was advised that the white stuff on the base of the machine could be "aluminum rot" which is akin to rust, but on aluminum.  In order to "treat " this, I must grind away all of the offending area and a clean margin around same.  Then I can prime and repaint it.

eeyeeew .  I guess it is time to find the respirator and get out the dremel tool.  WHAT WAS I THINKING??

Which brings me to a philosophical note.  I love these old machines and I think I am still in the mind that I need to rescue them....Then there is the old white treadle that sits out front. It was the machine that inspired this blog.  I decided to give up on it because it lacked the tension parts.  After exposure to the weather this winter it is rusty and the cabinet is de-laminating.  I took this photo for the big silver maple you see in the background.  This is its last winter with us.  The trunk is likely rotted and if we don't take it down, we fear it will fall on the fence.  Last February one of our neighbors took out a good portion of it with his car.  "We" are not interested in more fence repair.

So, why, if I am into rescue, did I put this one out to "pasture?"  I don't know.  I needed the room in the shop, I was tired of it, I know I would not find tension parts for it, I wanted a machine for out front....Many reasons.  I don't know if it means I am "recovering" from my addiction.  I doubt it.  But perhaps I will learn that some machines are just too far gone.  If I had looked more closely at "Sal" would I have left it behind?  Probably not.  Will I leave future "rot" machines behind?  Probably.  I know that these machines are worth saving.  Even "Sal" may have some value.  Not as a collector's item but as a functioning machine.  If people want to sew, and some still do, we really have to do our best to save worthy machines.  That is my belief.  Try to save them,if we can.  And pass them along.