It snowed a lot overnight. I think that we got about 8 or more inches. Steven was out early clearing the drive way and walk. Andrea and I made it out to the shop by 10 AM where we set to sorting and organizing about 200 miscellaneous bobbins.
Tedium does not begin to describe it.
I was supposed to photograph a single bobbin on the ruler with a label. I was easily distracted and failed to complete my assignment. Just the same we cleaned, culled and sorted the lot and now they are grouped in lots of 5 or 10 and tucked neatly away in their respective plastic bins. Andrea's goal was to sort through three bins. We made it through nine, condensing them into seven. The red labeled bins and lone white labeled bin at the end are the fruits of our labors.
We have an abundance of plastic class 66 bobbins, precious few class 15 bobbins but many Pfaff metal bobbins New Style. We have tons of 206/306/319 bobbins and many class 95 bobbins. Some other industrial bobbins as well. Sadly some were corroded and rusty so they went to the steam punk bin. Seriously I may try to sell them as steam punk. Who knows? Maybe a necklace?
I have some really wonderful friends. My mother told me so.
"Andrea is coming tomorrow for a few days." (me)
"Oh, your friend from the sewing machine repair class." (Mom)
"Yup, she is coming to help me sort out the parts from New Jersey." (Me)
"OH MY She is a GOOOOOOD friend. I wouldn't do that and I'm your mother!"
She is right. Andrea is a very good friend. She worked all day today on the White 477 cleaning and fixing it all up. I bought that machine 18 months ago. Betsy and I went to Albany on a jaunt. We bought two machines that day. A Kenmore and this White. It has been neglected on the shelf until today.
Our friend Linda has a White 639 and its tension assy was in a state. Andrea brought the assy with her and today we pulled out the 477 to compare tension assys.
"They are identical." ( me)
"Let's pull it off and see if we can figure out what is wrong with Linda's" (me)
But before we do that , shouldn't we make sure that the tension works? And as long as we are doing that we may as well clean it all up and get it ready." (Her)
So she set to work. The first thing she noticed, and I am sure that I would not have seen it, was the aberrant needle position. It was hitting the needle plate, ever so slightly.
After she cleaned the machine and oiled it, she set to adjusting the needle position.
"Let's see." And the next thing I knew she had determined that
"It's this screw right here."
She loosened the screw, adjusted the position of the needle and that was that.
Test stitching is a bit of a challenge in my shop. The work bench is at typical counter top height and generally the foot control doesn't reach to the floor. Who needs a floor when you have thighs?
"I do have one, you know." (Her)
"What?" ( Me)
"A Thigh Master."
So now, knee, foot and thigh sewing !
It is an absolutely beautiful machine. It has a good strong motor and makes a lovely stitch. Ready for a new home.
This is my neighbor's machine. She bought it with hopes to sew sheep skin. I have had it for several weeks. I have been cleaning it up. Boy it is dirty. It is also very very heavy.
It is rather imposing with all those external fittings.
It has a knee activated presser foot lifter. I have one on my 31 I love it.
It is equipped with a positive upper and under feeding mechanism.
It also has a roller edge guide. I can't figure out how to work it. Perhaps once it is cleaned up and re-installed I can figure it out.
It certainly has a beefy looking feed dog lifter and race. A class 15 bobbin fits, but it takes a heavier weight bobbin which fits better.
I did not take much apart to clean it. The race and shuttle assembly is very similar to my 31-15. That I felt I could manage
I thought that I would have to remove the feed dog lifter in order to remove the shuttle race. I seem to recall doing so on the 31-15.
But I could not get the screw loose so I could lower the arm shaft holding the feed dog lifter roller in place. Someone obviously had loosened this screw a time or two before I tried. Turns out, though, that I did loosen it and, ultimately, changed the feed dog height. I didn't know that until I tried a stitch test. I had to go back and adjust the feed dog height. I never did get it off though. I would have liked to check that roller.
I cleaned the parts in the ultrasonic cleaner then rinsed them with denatured alcohol and oiled all of them. It is nice to have clean parts. Were this my machine, I would have taken the whole feed mechanism apart and cleaned those parts as well. I had to just do my best to rinse with denatured alcohol and oil, over and over. I finally got the compressor out and just sprayed all that gunk out of there. That helped. The machine is stitching and while I would like to spend more time cleaning it up, I think my neighbor would like to get it back. I am sure she is anxious to play with it.
