Sewnoma

I think sews was just showing me the motor & spring, not the machine itself.

I do love those lotus decals, though. I'm very fond of all the Egyptian motifs found on these older machines. Sphinxes and scarabs and lotuses....some day I'm going to have to focus on those and collect up a few!!

General question out of idle curiosity - are 28/128's more common than 27/127's? Just asking because it seems kind of odd to me that I have both a 28 and a 128 but have not come across a 27 or 127 yet.

sews

Rodney is right, the lotus is a 66 (I had posted 127?).

I was also getting confused about the numbers and looked it up:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singer_Model_27_and_127

Both 27 and 28 are vibrating shuttle machines, the 28 is the 3/4 size version of the 27.

127 and 128 are *later versions* and are also full size (127) vs 3/4 size (128).....

Jennifer23

I think that it depends where you are. 27/127's were extremely common in western Canada; I probably see three 127's for every one other machine of any type. In the high arctic, on the other hand, the 3/4-size handcrank machines were the most common, because of their portability.

ThayerRags

While the statement above is generally true, there are exceptions. These long shuttle machines tend to be very confusing, because Singer over-lapped production of the different models. And to add to the confusion, different factories were producing different models for export because of the coming of electricity not being uniform across the world at the same time.

The 27 & 28 models were developed in the 1880s, and were generally hand or treadle-powered. The 127 & 128 models were developed in the 1910s, and were changed primarily to facilitate the use of electric motors. The switch from model 27 to 127 was fairly clean, but models of the 28 were still being made up until 1940 (which had a high bobbin winder, BTW), thirty years after the 128 had appeared. There were even 128s made as late as the 1940s that had a low bobbin winder and no-ejection shuttle carrier (like a 28).

Add to this, the common practice of independent shops upgrading 27s & 28s in the 1940s to look and act like 127s and 128s, and you have a real free-for-all trying to figure out what model a machine is by looking at it.

Singer should have called these models their “HP Class” for “hair-pullers”....

CD in Oklahoma

Sewnoma

I still get the 27 & 28 backwards until I pause to think about it. It's counter-intuitive to me that the smaller machine gets the larger number. It's the same with the 66 & 99 but somehow that's less confusing to me.

It is pretty cool comparing my 28 to my 128 though. I need to put them side-by-side and really look them over and see all that was changed. I love that stuff.

mjhaess

Shes a beauty...

Vridar

Gorgeous! I don't need one, repeat, I don't need one, repeat...