scorpius

Hi All;


I have several vintage sewing machines and wanted to ask if you can rate each of them for me in the
following 5 categories


1) Most Features

2) Most Dependable

3) Most Collectible

4) Sturdiest Construction

5) Most popular


The machines I have are the following;


A) Singer Fashion Mate 237

B) Singer zig zag 477

C) Singer Touch And Sew Model 758

D) Singer Athena 2000 Embroidery Sewing Machine

Mickey2

I'm sure you already know their differences, but from a vintage point of view, many value an all metal constuction highly, at least when it comes to gears and internal parts. I guess Fashion Mate 237 would top category 2 and 4, for some users maybe a third category too. It's a simple straight - zigzag machine, as far as I know hardly anything should go wrong with it, wear out easily or turn brittle with age. Worth spending some time and effort on fixing up.

I haven't had a Touch & Sew my self, but I would love to try out the fancy bobbin features. It's a model with a few plastic parts prone to need replacement. From a practical point of view the 758 is neither as dependable nor as durable as the 237, but it takes cams and are capable of a lot of stitches. If I'm correct it takes double cams, which means patterns with reverse stitching and over lock; in other words needle and feed dogs can move indepent of each other; quite fancy features. Replacement gears are available and it should be worth spending a bit of time and money on fixing it up. I know the Touch & Sew models were nick named Touch and Swear, maybe owners can give feed back on them. Some featuers might be cumbersome to use, or it might be down to how well the user became accustomed to them. It should have at least as many stitch patterns to chose from as the Athena 2000 model, even more. It means topping category 1. Does both Touch & Sew and Athena 2000 have the fancy bobbin functions?

For a collector any model can be interesting, it all depends upon view, interest and purpose. From a more practical point of view, the Singer Athena 2000 is the least one worth spending time and money on fixing up. When the circuit board fails I doubt it can be replaced or repaired. To what degree can a 40 year old circiut board be trusted?

Cari-in-Oly

Pretty much from a collectible point of view none of these stand out. Given a choice the only one I'd be interested in is the 237. It's said to have the best satin stitch of any Singer and an added plus is it can be treadled. Lot's of quilters use this machine.
The Touch N Sews have a small following but they're not really worth anything. People either love them or hate them.
The Athena isn't really an embroidery machine. It has some fancy stitches that can be used for what you can call embroidery. According to every Singer OSMG I've ever seen have something to say about them, they were junk right from the start. Same with the Futuras.

Cari

Macybaby

I agree with Cari - I'd pass on all of them. I did have a fashion mate at one time, decent machine - it now belongs to s niece who uses it extensive.

I'm not sure how many Singers I have now, I had over 30 last count - and I've bough a few more since.

scorpius

Thank you all for the great replies ,

I have had these in a closet for some time and was wondering which might be the best "modern machine" out of the lot to clean up and use ,

basing my decision on amount of features , dependability , and eventual collectability ...

PS: I call these "modern machines" as I have an old singer treadle machine in a parlor cabinet which is my "old machine"

Farmhousesewer

I had a Singer Athena 2000 and loved it, although it was later flagged as one with many problems by OSMGs.

scorpius

Thank you all for your replies , I am thinnig out he herd so will probably keep the 758 or 447 and sell the others

bkay

The 758 doesn't have double cams. It has the "top hat" style removable cams, not the flat ones. It will not make a zig zag without a cam. (I have a 758 and a 778, which is the same, only portable.)

bk