Anne Bonnys Locker

I imported a couple of the base machines out of Taiwan - 2000U-33W - and I was not at all impressed. In the end I was very careful to sell them to people who only needed a very light duty machine and certainly didn't want to sew leather. the concept is great but these are not machines I would ever suggest for leather and, in fact, I have decided not to import them at all as their application is quite limited. Somebody else has decided to push these in Australia and I wish him well but at the price he is selling them I fear for his long term survival as he has left little margin for warranty. As Wiz has so rightly pointed out, you need to save your pennies and sink them into a machine that is working in the middle of its range as pushing the limit day in and day out will end in tears !

This machine takes standard rotary bobbins, bobbin case and slide plates. Bob (sewmun) and every other dealer will have them.

A 45k25 manual should do the trick. Jim Saddler gave me a hint that I have used successfully several times on these machines which is to retard the timing fractionally when sewing thick leather. This gives the loop more time to form.

Not a big fan of trying to make one machine do everything as there are always compromises - as Wiz has pointed out. There are lots of options that will sew up to about 3/8" with 135X17 needles such as the Seiko CW8. Like all cylinder bed machines a flat bed is not hard to cobble up.

Probably 95% of the industrial machines out there were designed for garment sewing and top out at #69 thread.

You will always be limited by the design itself as it isn't a matter of speed. Pretty much all heavy thread machines are oscillating hook from the Singer 42-5 up to the Juki 441. Rotating hooks work great at high speed but have many limitations.

What Jim Said!!!!!!! When I sell machines to novices I can always tell those who listen to my advice as they actually spend time practicing (staring with no thread) and learn to guide the work ring me and tell me that they are very happy. Those who just try to sew their major project as soon as they get the machine ring me and complain. This is an excellent looking machine and should give you decades of pleasure even when you add a 441 clone to your collection.

I think my business partner has some 20X1's in 18g. Shoot her an email : info@cyndykitt.com.au

This design of machine is so good that the Chinese still make it in a smaller form, although not made well.

A working machine that you can demonstrate is worth a lot more than one that "might work"!

White Rotary bobbins are available - I think the part number is 744.

Look at it this way - Pick up the first 31 you see at a good price then build up the set. Why not have an 18, 19 and 20 (or 15) as they all fit in the same table and you have three specialised machines only taking up the space of one. It might be possible but it would be a two hour job to change over the bottom end.

Don't build your own bobbin winder as they are only worth about $20. I don't have stock at the moment but Mark Foster in Melbourne has Servo Motors for sale.

Was watching an episode of "American Pickers" recently and they visited a guy who used to trade as "Goatman Leather". The boys don't pay much attention to sewing machines but there was the odd glimpse of some interesting machinery including what may have been a Puritan stitcher. The guy has retired and I think he was based somewhere in Ohio so if you like old iron it might be worth tracking him down.

For decorative stitching I would go for the 31-18 which is a roller foot, roller feed machine and very common in the shoe industry. I have nearly finished one as a treadle for a local leather worker.

A standard bobbin winder can be modified to do it but as the bobbins are tapered they cannot be set up to automatically release when the bobbin is full. There is a way to do it but I don't want to share the method as one day I plan to offer them for sale - eventually - when I get time - when I set my lathe up.

Unfortunately the bobbins won't work with a standard bobbin winder.

Easier to get the spindle with the eccentric it fits into. Check with Bob at Toledo but if he has not got it I think I have a couple in stock.

The GA5-1R is the modern version of the Singer 45k89. You will get as many opinions of the machine as there are people on this board. The 45k series and similar from other manufacturers are probably the most numerous machines built over the last 100 years for sewing up to around 1/2" of leather. Look up the recent posts of JimSaddler as he has some excellent commentary, from a man who has used them for decades, on the use of this style of machine. If what you want is a simple, inexpensive machine then it may be the answer for you. Until the advent of the relatively inexpensive 441 clone this is probably the machine that you would have bought without a second thought but these days the decision is more complicated. My personal feeling is that there is still a place in the workshop for one of these. Naturally I feel the same about the 441, 29k etc., etc..........

It is a copy of the Singer 18-2 shoe vamping machine.

The technical term for that being "GRUNT" There always exceptions and a good example is the Singer 42-5. It only takes a DPX16 but it will run any thread that will go through the needle as that was what it was designed for with that bloody great hand wheel. It will do things that would give a Chinese GC0302 a haemorrhage! And of course it can do all of that as a treadle (my favourite type of drive). What I was trying to give is a general idea of machine capacity not a definitive one. In my business I seem to spend nearly as much time educating people about what the term "industrial" really means as I do selling machines, although I mostly find that spending the time to explain and referring them to sites like this actually sells me more machines. It is often better to give people the resources to confirm what you have just told them so they can see you are being honest. Those who do the research tend to give me the most repeat business! I will have to do a test-to-destruction on a GC0302 type machine with a heavy weight flywheel and upgraded tension just to see how well they are built.

Jim Beaton (JimSaddler) has offered to spend time with you and show you the intricacies of what you want to do. Stop buggerising around and take him up on the offer. flying back to Queensland and spending a day with Jim is going to save you tens of thousands of dollars in the long run and get your project up and running.

The machines are built for the third world so they are extremely simple and don't need much in the way of service. Needles are 15X1 so readily available. It has very similar performance to the 29k but can be inconsistent with M20 thread so I stick to M40. The problem with the machines at $US167 is that the chances of them working as they arrive are less than 50% so every machine I sell is first tested and is sold with everything the customer needs including needles, timber base, tool kit and instructions.

Thanks for that! A lot depends on the machine. I brought in a Chinese machine that uses a DDX1 and was claimed to sew 18mm - the foot was cut away and the needle bar all but hit the leather - but I was able to sew 18mm!

A question that is often asked is how heavy a leather a machine will sew and while this is not definitive and there are exceptions the following might help. DBX1, DPX5, Domestic Needle: Light only - Garment leather with #69 DPX16, DPX16: Light to medium, generally to 7-8mm depending on the design of the machine with 138-207 thread DDX1, 328: Medium Heavy. Depending on the machine 10-12mm. Anything up to #415 794, 7X3 Very Heavy. 18-22mm Any thread commercially available. This is not meant to be definitive. There are all sorts of exceptions and I would appreciate feedback from our more knowledgeable members and dealers.