Silver Case

Huh? My post disappeared!

emergency re-write!

Anyway, all I was going to say was that I finally got the gearing of my sewing machine transmission geared down from a 85mm output pulley to a 50mm. Now the speed is much more manageable.

The only snafu was that my belt was too long after the change. I bought a replacement, but it was too short. Finally on monday I found the Mama Bear belt that fit just nice.

Hah the only issue this caused? The gearing is so low that it’s hard to turn the handwheel without letting out a bit of clutch.

So now I can get back to my hats.

My Juki walking-foot sewing machine runs too fast for me to control accurately. So today I bought a replacement motor pulley to gear it down. The original pulley was 85mm. This pulley is 50mm diameter. That should cut the linear feed speed to 58% of whatever it is now. I think that should be just nice.

I attempted to install the pull tonight, but alas now the V-belt is too long. Oops. I’ll have to replace that, too.

I managed to self-repair my Juki last night. I accidentally sucked thread into the hook assembly again. After fifteen minutes of screwing around I got it all cleared out. I shouldn’t have taken so long — I took off one part too many and spent some time putting it back together. The precision of all the small parts is quite cool and amazing. I’d like to get a copy of a service man’s troubleshooting/repair manual, but so far haven’t found anything but the useless general user’s manual.

So after making the red leather pouch I decided to make something for myself, and whipped out a second pouch to carry around a couple of external USB hard drives. I managed to do that pouch with a bit more precision, but the materials were pretty cheap so it didn’t look especially sharp, but suits its purpose.

After being annoyed this evening, I sat down at my Singer u20 and finished the embroidery of the ‘K’ and ‘E’ in Luke’s recent project. Since they changed the gearing to slow down the u20, the difference is night and day, it’s really way, way, way easier to embroider with it. I look forward to trying some more precision embroidery with it soon.

So now I have a big hank of purple 1000 denier cordura with an embroidered ‘LUKE’. Now next step is figuring out what to make from it. I’d kind of like to make him a tiny messenger back to wear. I need to consult him first. He likes to be involved in materials selection as well as to sit on my lap as I sew. He was hectoring me two days ago about the embroidery, so I’ll let him know tomorrow morning that that phase is complete.

A couple weeks ago a neighbor was asking me pointed questions about whether I could sew a bag for her. I tried to fend off the idea with some mono-syllables and diversion. I certainily have enough projects for myself, without having to add others’ to my list. [Recently I also had to decline the invitation to build a unicycle for someone. Basically I could spend $600 and twenty hours to build one (the wheel/cranks are specialty) or point him to the store that sells them for $130]

I came home, loaded, from Morton’s last night. Sitting in the bedroom Ling says, “Look what she [neighbor] dropped off today…” I let out a groan….. a hank of red leather. Ugh. Mrs. Neighbor couldn’t catch a clue, could she?

I spent an hour this morning taking care of a number of irritating administrivia that I’d been putting off. It always is nice to have those tiny burdens off my chest. My Juki is operable again(*) so I decided this evening I should put this final bit to rest too.

The neighbor gave me a tiny, cheap pouch, which I gather she wanted an analog of. So I gave her a slightly larger, lined, pouch with a handle and a YKK zipper. Actually it wasn’t too terrible a task. I refined my lined pouch design a bit and learned a few new tricks. The next one I make should be look quite sharp.

I think Helen’s Red Pouch is ok for an hour’s work anyway.

(*) The Sewing Machine Uncle showed me how to dissasemble the rotating hook assembly in my Juki 1181N. So now I can clean it out and re-tune myself. whew. The fundamental problem is from running the machine w/o fabric (or with the foot up) which allows thread to get sucked down into the hook assembly shaft — major mess. This is not a toy for girls.

S&M Sewing dispatched a repair uncle to fix my machine this afternoon. I was spared any embarrassment: there really were serious mis-calibrations — the timing of the hook and needle was off. Consequently the bobbin hook didn’t swing across the needle’s groove. Also the topthread tension control is some sort of plug-in cartridge and it seemed to have slipped along the shaft and was no longer giving correct tension.

So now everything is working well again. I watched what the guy was doing, but his english was horrible, so it was a bit of a duck-interpreting-a-chicken situation. I am really confused how the three screws on the bobbin rotation shaft control the vertical height of the hook/needle interface. I also miss what was really occurring with the thread tensioner and how to decide where it belongs. But hopefully this stuff, now reseated, will stay. I think the initial factory settings must have needed to be tightened.

He said the tension ratio top:bobbin would be like 5:3 or 8:7 (yeah, apparently its nonlinear?)

He checked my Singer u20 and it was fine, except for me having the top thread tension too high.

Welding went ok last night. My big breakthrough was kicking the stool away, squatting down, and holding the TIG torch like a pencil. Why does that all help? Because then I can really see the luminescent green arc cone hitting the material and to see how the weld pool is behaving. In some ways, it feels very similar to oxy-acetylene brazing.

I did lots of butt joints then got bored so I started lap joints. The first two were harrowing disasters. On the third I consulted my Miller TIG handbook which explained the angles to hold the torch and rod. That made all the difference in the world and I laid down several laps with minimal scalloping or undercutting of the upper plate. For fun I also welded a couple mitered, thick aluminum tubes. That was a lot of material to heat up and the cleaning action seemed to be boiling off unlimited quantities of garbage from the plate.

Don’t ask about the corner joint I tried to weld.

I brought my welds to the workshop today to do some destructive forensics on them… to see how deep the welds penetrated, how strong they were, etc. Aside from the strength test of the lap joint (I had to do some substantial pounding of a wedge to break the weld), I couldn’t determine anything. The aluminum filler rod (er5356) must be identical or very close to the aluminum plate because it was absolutely impossible for me to see where the weld stopped and the base material began. It was nothing like the welding textbook photos.

I’d upload all my photos, but I forgot the camera at Straits Dispatch, so I’ll have to do it later. I won’t be in the workshop much tomorrow or this weekend because Ling will be away having a solo mother’s vacation in Kuala Lumpur. She hasn’t spent a night away from Luke in very-close to five years (he turns five in June!!!). So this is a big deal, but mostly to Ling. Luke doesn’t seem to care (although tonight I think he was testing how much he could get away with while Ling was out for the evening) and I’m ok with it. Ling has left me a large schedule and agenda for Luke’s Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It’s written in a thick magic marker as if it were for a five year old to read. Perhaps she thinks Luke will be able to cross-check me?

My Juki sewing machine has really pissed me off. It was sewing great, then some thread caught, and ever since its tensioning will not work properly. The thread behaves as if the top thread tension is too low. I can tighten that and loosen the bobbin tension and it didn’t help, in fact it made it worse. (the bobbin thread lies flat along the wrong side, the top thread makes big hoops on the wrong side and as I fussed with the tension more and more, eventually was making soft loops on the right side as well). It feels like something is out of adjustment beyond just the tension adjusters, and I know I have threaded everything properly, so I am going to have them send a technician over and sort this out. Very irritating.

The 9Velos are approaching completion. The main frames are totally done and right now I’m working on the forks. As soon as those two are done, I’ll clean the whole lot up and send the frames and forks for powder-coating. I screwed up yesterday and made fork blades to the wrong dimensions. Fortunately they are perfect for another bike project I have scheduled next so I didn’t have to scrap them, but it set me behind a day. Fingers crossed, I should have both frames finished on Monday. (I doubt I’ll get to the shop this weekend)

My Juki DU-1181 Walking Foot sewing machine arrived today.

What a terror. Yeah, it has a powerful four pole motor, but so does my Singer Singer 20u professional. What makes the Juki so deadly is its “walking foot” feed mechanism.

It’s not a traditional presser foot with a feed dog that pulls from underneath. A walking foot is a two-piece presser foot that actively pulls, “walking” the material back through the needle. Consequently it can eat tremendous thickness of material with ease. The spec sheet says it can eat up to 15mm thick. I fed 1/4″ thick hard leather which is devoured.

I have good knife-edge needles to use with it too, better than ball-end for these applications. Making bags is going to be so much easier now–the material will feed well and the needles are stout enough to handle hard materials.

One of the projects I finished this weekend was a random carrying bag I made on impulse when I was inspired by a piece of red felt scrap a few weeks ago. I wound up with a roughly A4-sized cordura bag embroidered with felt and thick cotton-lined, closed with a lapped zipper and a red webbing handle. Worksmanship is not perfect, but the zipper application and general stitching was cleaner than previous projects.

It is still the dark of night.

I built a custom-sized Forward Air Controller messenger bag this month.

I’m nearly finished my latest messenger bag, but in the meantime, I wanted to work on a different project. I have an idea for a jacket, but before I attempt a pattern like that, I figured I ought to find a substantially simpler pattern, to give me the basic idea of using a pattern.

So I bought a Simplicity brand pattern for a (simple) tee shirt. I bought some maroon jersey fabric and went to work. Five hours later I had a $23 vaguely-ill-fitting t-shirt with numerous QC blemishes.

I made one major mistake, and that was tracing out the wrong size-line on the front neck piece. Consequently the head-hole is way too deep in the front. So I had to screw around and make a different neck/collar ribbing to fit. It doesn’t lay very nice, and the hole is too big for my taste.

Design/pattern problems I noted? The sleeves, although they compiled nicely, aren’t really the right sizes. The arm pit holes are a bit on the snug side, and the sleeves are too short by 1.5 inches before I even hem them. The shirt’s overall length was way too long. I sheared off 4-5″ before I even started, and this was about right. These are all things I supposedly could fix. I am thinking to turn the paper pattern into a muslin pattern and fine tune it to my liking. (a lot of fucking work). Why didn’t they say use ribbing for the collar? I’d prefer that to fabric, I think.

How do I avoid accidentally puckering bits on collars?

Knit jersey material is really annoying to work with. I hate the way it rolls under itself.

I need to get a double needle. That was frequently called for to finish off seams and stitches.

Woei’s Christmas present is a custom-sized pouch to hold the Playstation Portable PSP his stewardess girlfriend gave him.

I made it out of 400denier Cordura in a MARPAT pattern. The inner lining is made from a 1951 aviator’s escape-and-evasion silk map.

The purple zipper is a little highlight to remind you of the blue led’s favored by the sony PSP.

Lessons learned? Is there some sort of glue that I can seal the edge of silk with? It wants to unravel at all costs. This map is not pure silk. When I burn it, it leaves some plastic turd-blob.

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UPDATE: I have a rolled or double hemmer foot in my collection. It feeds in the fabric, does a double roll, and sews it into a flat, neat hem. I tried it once, in the store, and it was a disaster. The machine was too fast, I didn’t feed it properly, and it was a joke. The lady demoed it effortlessly. But I checked tonight and found some online instructions. After a couple tries on the very fine, weak silk evasion maps, I know have the basic idea of it, and can do a passable job. Another couple meters of it, and I’ll be fine. So what this means is I can put a strong, tidy hem into my pieces of silk, which means no more ravelling, and no need to glue or do anything else obscene. wheee!

I made my first lined pouch today. It turned into Tien Lee’s Christmas present. Not really sure what she’ll keep in it, as it’s roughly the dimension of a 6-stick pack of White Owls.

Now that I have a lined pouch and a zipper under my belt, I’m going to do something a bit more subtle, using some of my silk evasion maps as a liner.

My Singer u20 Professional arrived today, tuned and accessorized. I even got an english manual.

After ripping through some canvas duck, I pulled out some of the hunks of leather I’d bought in Tokyo. Sure enough, with a proper leather needle, I sewed through quarter-inch leather with no problems. I need to get a better selection of leather needles, though. My machine takes commercial (round shank) needles. Although I can install home-use needles, they are not strong enough. My machine snapped one of the home use needles. I need to get some 16-20 shank leather commercial sewing needles before I can do much.

After playing with leather, I wanted to work on applique using the kimono fabric I’d bought in Tokyo and some of the 800d cordura fabric I’d bought in Singapore. Accidentally, my embroidery thread color matched the kimono.

As a second attempt, it worked out really well. The poorer sections of the stitching here was because I hadn’t threaded the bobbin correctly. After I got that resolved, it worked perfectly. This machine has a knee-operated lever to lift the presser foot. This turns out to be terrific for sewing the curves in applique. A small lift makes it easier to smoothly turn the piece.

Now I need to go make something proper I guess.

Last I checked, I was going to get a Yamato DP-1111 Industrial Sewing machine. I went by the shop today to check it out, and they showed me another model, a Singer Professional 20u. They actually recommended I take the Singer instead. It has the same functionality (straight and zig-zag) as the Yamato, almost the same power, and parts (including speciality feet) are much, much easier to get hold over. As an added bonus, it cost $750 as opposed to the $1000 Yamato.

I tried it out and it tore though many layers of my toughest fabrics, so I have no concern about its power. I did long seams of applique run, and the stitching was uniform. It was manufactured in Japan, unlike modern Singers, so it has the same build quality as the Yamato. I think I will be able to get a manual for it as well.

They’re going to deliver it to me next Thursday, a public holiday (Hari Raya Haji), the day after I get back from five days in Tokyo. Wheeee can’t wait.

About five years ago I had a brilliant idea for a Christmas gift for Ling, an expensive, fine Janome sewing machine. Boy that went over really well. It sat in a closet forever, labelled ‘The White Elephant’ by Ling and never touched.

Dad used it once to repair some luggage. Recently I got it out to make some messenger bags. It works well, to a point, until I start taking on heavy layers of tough material. It’s really better suited to making clothes, not munitions. I ‘need’ a stronger sewing machine.

Ling did some research with her mom’s seamstress friend and found a sewing machine store that specializes in new and used industrial sewing machines. So as a suprise today, she took me to the store to let me pick out my Christmas present, an industrial sewing machine!

These things are no toys. Rather than some puny electric motor in the sewing machine, these sit on a dedicated table with a massive 0.5-1hp electric motor mounted below. Rather than the foot pedal controlling power to the motor, it is a mechanical linkage that engages a clutch linkage between motor and machine. And when I say clutch, it’s just like learning to drive a 1967 GTO. Total tire burnout. A home sewing machine, at top speed, might do 600 stitches per minute. These things do more like 2500-3000 stitches per minute. They sound like a vulcan chain gun.

An example of electric clutch sewing machine motor. Not for my unit, but similar.

I brought along a bunch of ‘difficult’ fabric and webbing. This thing chewed through it like a total joke. No problem at all.

I tested my stitching out on a Brother machine. But it only did straight stitches. I need one that can do zig-zag so that I can do embroidery and bar-tacks. So she pointed me at a Japanese Yamato DP-1111. This has those features, and against the odds, is even more powerful than the Brother I tested out. Demented.

Yamato DP-1111

So they’re going to setup this sewing machine on a proper seamstress table (even has built in meter stick on the table) and tune it up. I asked them to take pity on me and significantly gear-down the motor. It’s just too fast to use for my purposes. This should be trivial to switch out some pulley ratios.

Once it’s setup, I’ll go over during the week and test it out. Unfortunately I can’t find much at all about this machine online, let alone a manual. I’ll have to give a shot at contacting Yamato Sewing Machines directly and begging them for one.

I tried out some appliqué techniques today.

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The blue fabric, even though I ironed on some backing, was still too lightweight to take the applique, and puckered. I had the thread tension very low already, so I don’ tthink there was much I could do. I did some other applique on a piece of canvas, and there was, no surprise, no pucker.

I still don’t center the needle perfectly at the edge of the appliqué, so the coverage isn’t always great. Of course, I’m also battling impatience… there is always an urge to fire off a lot of stitches before stopping and rotating the fabric.

One annoying thing about my sewing machine is that it is very hard to iterate the movements of the pedal. I will want, for example to do exactly three forward stitches, and for the needle to stop on the left. It’s hard to do just three stitches, let alone stop on the correct side. Would be nice if there was some sort of pulse feed control I could use to toggle through the process. I would assume there are machines optimized for appliqué, alas this doesn’t seem to be one.