Thursday, January 28, 2016

Super Supernovas

A few of you have chuckled about my "wall of shame" where I referred to a whole collection of Vikings that might not ever get fixed (but I do have a goal of fixing them). Now I fear I have a shelf of Necchi's that might have to be labeled a "shelf of shame" due to their various failures and mine.

Tuesday dawned and I was finally going to get my international shipping accomplished. There was a hold-up at the post office at my work and they finally said we-don't-know-what-to-do and I ended up taking the Domestic sewing machine to my local USPS. Only five minutes of looking at my forms and the paid receipt I received six hours after payment, they slapped the labels on and said GO! I headed on over to one of my favorite resale stores because it's senior day on Tuesday = 40% off. And there it was, a Necchi Supernova. Very dirty, in a cabinet, crumbling wires, but it was a Necchi! All of the moving parts moved but I knew this was dangerous ground so I walked away. Please note: I walked away. Once home I told my husband and he said "So where is it?" and I had to brag about my severe restraint: I didn't buy it...until I asked. We headed back and looked it over, figuring it wasn't a bad deal at $6. That's right, $6.

One very dirty Supernova
We got it home and I took it out of the cabinet immediately and started to put new wires on it. I used the same foot control but all new wire and their plug for the machine and my new plug for the wall outlet. We plugged it in and the foot control crackled. STOP! After much discussion I used a different foot control: SMOKE. So again it was STOP but now the multi-meter came out and all of the connections were tested. It was decided since both of the foot controls were older and untested maybe we just had two bad ones? I retried with a know good foot control and got the same result: crackling. Upon closer inspection of the plug into the machine, it looked like it I might have pushed the points into the wrong "lanes" on the cord, causing it to feed back into itself. That sounds very confusing so here's a photo:
Wire lays down into the channel (top) and covered with plate (bottom)
Not sure what's going to happen now but I'll clean her up and set aside until I can get more information about this model. In the meantime, I have another one that is working but has been languishing. I get it out and try to remember what was not working right and it comes down to the cams not turning.
Center spindle for the cam sorta turns but since there are no cams to fit maybe it does work right?
 Even more important, I do not have a cam that fits this model and I have two sets, just not for this one. Sigh. I put it back with notes on the label and hope I can find the right cams. Always hopeful.

One final look at that very dirty Supernova:
Yea, she needs a good cleaning and that's going to have to be enough for now. Shelf of shame? She joins two others that are for parts. Always hopeful.

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