nmtonimarie

Does anyone have any experience or knowledge about The Sewing Machines Institute in Texas?

They teach many sewing machine repair courses in Texas and have online courses as well. I'm looking at taking a course so I can work on my own machine.

cashs_mom

Hmmm. . . it looks interesting. But with all the youtubes out there for the popular machines, I'm not sure you need to take a course to work on a vintage machine. I don't do the work on my new machine myself because it would void the warranty. I also don't do my serger or Bernina. I just don't have the time or energy to do them myself. I have a good OSMG

Grace creates

If a course was nearby my home I would take the course, providing it was reasonably priced.

Ariannaquilts

I do all of my vintage machines but not the computerized one's for the same reason, I don't want to void my warranty either. Like cashs_mom I don't see the point of taking a class since there are so many how to videos that walk you through every step. Good luck with whatever you decide to do!

liking quilting

I would take the class!

quiltedsunshine

I looked at the courses a few years ago, but it was too expensive.

There's so much to learn! I'm still learning new things about sewing machine repair, and I've been doing it for 10 years. I don't know how you could learn it all in one course. But, vintage machines are a whole different animal than the newer, computerized machines. I guess you could get the basics, and figure out the rest as you go.

nmtonimarie

I probably should have been a little more specific with my question. Mainly I'd like to learn to do more of the routine maintenance. I clean out the lint, change needles frequently but I would like to do whatever is involved in a machine tune-up. I'm frustrated with the amount of time it takes in my area to have a machine serviced at the one reputable place near me, the next good place I know of is 50 or more miles away. I have a Janome DC3050 about 8 years old, has never needed anything but routine maintenance and I've used it on everything--lingerie, clothes, upholstery, quilting, FMQ even--it gets a lot of use! Also I have a 60 year old Singer, used infrequently and a Featherweight that would need a lot of work to make it useful.

Sewing Machines Institute is expensive if you go there and take live course but they do have dvd/mp3 course for under $300 and that's the one I was looking at.

I appreciate everyone's answers!

quiltedsunshine

Yea, $300 would be worth doing! If you could learn how to balance the tensions, check and set all the timing settings, open the machine and clean and oil throughout, service the motor, check for burrs and polish them out, etc. If you get those things down, you can figure out the rest. The hardest part about working with machines like your Janome, is getting the dang thing open without damaging the connections to the circuit board. LOL! But you can usually do most work on that machine without opening the machine up.

nmtonimarie

Quiltedsunshine - thanks! That's exactly what I had in mind.

dublb

I took the course as Temple is just 2 hours away from me. I learned so very much. I highly recommend the classes. David & Jeremiah are wonderful teachers. I learned how to get into those machines & they are so very interesting. Now ya'll are right about warranty work. You need your dealers that sold your machine to ya for that but machines that there is no warranty left on, this class is wonderful! There are a lotta machines that are outta warranty yet still need to be serviced yearly. Sewing machine oil evaporates in a year. Even if ya had your machine serviced a year ago & haven't used is since, don't turn it on as ya will be running it dry.