Melanie Ham

You are here: Home / quilt / Free Motion Quilting on a Vintage Singer 201-2

Free Motion Quilting on a Vintage Singer 201-2

By:

The main reason why I wanted to buy a vintage sewing machine was so that I could quilt my quilts at home and not have to send them out to a quilter.  Not that I am opposed to that, I just don’t have it in the budget.  So after shopping around and realizing that a larger sewing machine (by that I mean larger arm space or harp space for a quilt to fit, I’ll show you) was not going to happen… for a very long time, I tried to think about plan B.  In my research I discovered that the vintage machines can do free-motion, they are easy to find, workhorse machines and a fraction of the price.  I used some birthday money from my Dad and Stepmom to buy a machine on Ebay and bought a $40 sewing desk on Craigslist.

I have had some frustrating moments with this machine.  In my frugality, I bought a machine that had not been cleaned or serviced, it just worked.  So when I got it, it was quite dirty and in need of some tlc.  This process has been annoying at times, but overall I feel like I really know my machine.  I won’t fill you in on all the gory details besides a few tips on how I got the free motion working well.  I can save that for a different post if anyone is interested, but the machine is working perfectly… exactly what I wanted and I’m pretty excited about that.

Here are my settings for free-motion

Tension: just over 1

Make sure bobbin tension is correct, my machine likes it tight.  (I fiddled with this forever and it got my stitch looking great once it was right)

Aurifil thread (see photo for specs)

Feed dogs up (I don’t know why, but my machine goes haywire when you drop the dogs and it doesn’t make much difference in moving the fabric around.)

Now here is the real kicker.  All the hours of fussing with my machine to get a nice stitch is worth it to have this…

See that cute little jadeite dish that holds my safety pins?  I mean – the difference is pretty obvious.

I’m about 1/3 done with quilting this quilt.  Can’t wait to show you when it’s finished!!

Comments

  2. For newest information you have to pay a quick visit the web and on web I found this web site as a
    finest site for newest updates.

  3. Hello there! Do you know if they make any plugins to safeguard against hackers?

    I’m kinda paranoid about losing everything I’ve worked hard on.

    Any tips?

  4. Car shopping can be very time consuming. There are plenty
    of cars you can look at, as well as a handful of factors to consider.
    You need to make sure you are aware of what you need to make
    it a better experience. Consider the following helpful advice for making
    things easier on you.

  5. Is that a Singer brand free motion quilting foot? I have the same Singer 201-2, but don’t have a free motion foot for it.

  7. I have the same machine!!!!! I absolutly LOVE it!!! It is the only machine I have so it is hard for me to buy a new one when the one I have is such a nice tight stitch, and is so cheap to fix when broken 😀 I hope you do a post on what it looks like!!! I have never acomplished what you are about to do so, if you did a video on how to do it I would love you FOREVER!!!! LOL

  8. Don’t think I realized the width differences in the throat till I saw your side by side scale photos. Um, yeah, that’s a big difference. I’m picturing my previous attempts to roll and accordion-fold the various larger-scale boat projects I’ve tried to fit through my 1960’s singer. I’m inspired. Thanks for posting the side by side comparison. And the other plus? That is one beautiful little machine. Glad you feel like you know it better after wrestling with the broken parts & cleaning issues. Kinda like our boat. 🙂

  9. Most of these posts are another language to me, but i enjoy reading them 🙂 Why are you dropping the dog, and is Jack helping you with that? Have a great weekend.

  11. Wow this machine looks great! I have a Featherweight, but it does not have the room your 201 has. I’d love to find one with that big of an opening. Did you find your machine on Craigs list??

Trackbacks

Copyright

You may not sell my patterns, claim them as your own or distribute the written pattern. Please have any friends or those interested visit the free blog post or purchase their own ad free pdf. You may make individual items to sell (i.e. on Etsy, at craft fairs) from my patterns but please link back to my blog and share pattern credit. You are welcome to share finished items from my patterns on social media, make sure and tag me so that I can cheer you on!