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Machine Issues!

You've gotten half way through a project and suddenly your sewing machine has had enough of playing nice! What do you do?!?!?! 

Panic? 

Stress out? 

List off a whole load of profanities? 

Jump straight to Google? 

Yep I did the lot!

Over the Christmas period I enjoyed time to myself and spending quality time planning tops for presents and my own personal stash. Then as I was finishing off a top for my grandma, the sewing machine began to play up. Puckering, creating large thread messes on the underneath of the garment and making an awful racket. So I gave up. I went to good old google and searched for possible reasons why this happened, tried the thread tensions, unthreaded and rethreaded the machine...twice. Still no luck. 

Now if you are like me and have been given a hand-me-down sewing machine, it is highly likely your instruction and cleaning manual is missing. Luckily mine did come with the original machine oil, but I have been reassured that you can buy little tubes of sewing machine oil from local haberdasheries or online.

Now my first step was to google how to service a sewing machine and I found lots of different videos and websites detailing how they consult their manual. GREAT! I have no manual. 

Then I found this great youtube video and decided I'd give it a go myself sans manual.


Each sewing machine is different and I didn't use as many pieces of equipment as she did. I simply used the trusty screw driver kit, cotton buds (the cosmetic kind with the pointed end) and the sewing machine oil.

I did have an issue removing the top needle plate, but after spending a bit of time assessing my sewing machine I removed the paneling round the lightbulb area and voila! Easy access!

It was amazing to see just how dirty the sewing machine was. 

If your machine is having a slight midlife crisis or you just think it is time it had a good clean; give this a go. My machine is now running smoothly and I am back to planning my next project.

Fabric is already in the washing machine in preparation for a stretch jersey top. More details to come!




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