Friday, March 22, 2013

One Thin Dime

When I was sewing on Wednesday I noticed that the stitch length would change if I put even the slightest drag on the fabric.  Adjusting the amount of pressure on the foot did nothing to change it.  I did change from the marked needle plate back to the standard one.  That helped some.  The marked needle plate is a bit thicker than the standard one so the feed dog height was compromised when using that plate.  It certainly did FEEL as if the feed dogs weren't high enough.  So I found my feed dog height gauge in the change jar.  Sure enough, they were too low.

Adjusting the feed dog height on the 201 is pretty straight forward.

 Turn the machine over so you can see its underside.  Identify the feed dog drop thumb screw.  Just above that is a screw.  Loosen it.  That will allow the whole feed dog mechanism to move up and down.   Using your feed dog height gauge, set the feed dogs to the proper height and then tighten the screw.  Easy Peasy.

 You say you don't have the feed dog height gauge?  Yes you do. In your change jar.  It 's a dime

Be careful not to move the whole mechanism left to right.  It looks as if these feed dogs might not be centered in the openings.  I will check on that tomorrow.  The fabric fed very nicely as I sewed tonight so it may not be a problem.

9 comments:

  1. Ha! That's great, thanks for the quick tip. I'm so excited, I did a hook timing adjustment for the first time last night. It was a 401a that was out for trash collection, yikes. I can see why they didn't want it, probably hadn't made a stitch in a long time. Also freed up the frozen cam selectors, centered the needle bar, yada yada. Beautiful machine, ready to go now. Thanks in no small part to the wonderful contributions from you and others on the web, I was confident to get a little further in than normal. --Tanya

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Any 401 is too good for the trash. Even if it's not sewing or will never sew again there are spare parts to harvest. Well done on saving one and getting it going again.

      Hugs
      G

      Delete
  2. I'm soo impressed! Can't tell you how much I've been learning from your blog. thanks for sharing!
    Jean

    ReplyDelete
  3. GREAT. That's why I do it. Oh and it keeps me out of the pool halls and off the streets.

    ReplyDelete
  4. yay! i adjusted the feed dog on my singer 237 fashion mate using your simple, concise directions! please add a tag for 237 users, as this certainly did the trick for 'old nessie'!

    ReplyDelete
  5. oh this is brilliant. I bought a new marked plate for the machine and couldnt understand why it wouldnt sew as well as it did before. Now I know; thanks so much!

    ReplyDelete
  6. If you dogs move up and down but not really forward on a 201, any advice on how to fix that? New to 201's and my feed dogs don't feed and don't really advance.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It is likely that the stitch length regulator is gunked up with old oil and dirty. Clean and oil the machine completely. I would start by moving the stitch length regulator lever to the longest stitch and clean and oil all around the feed mechanism underneath.

      Delete