BLW Report post Posted July 4, 2012 Hello everyone, This is a heads up on my evolving project to make replacement timing belts for the venerable and quite frankly OLD...or more kindly described as the vintage Singer 95-1. Regardless of the questionable thinking of the Singer designers during the early 1900's who designed a high speed short arm factory garment machine that used a LEATHER timing belt to drive a rotary hook, many of these machine are still out there sitting on shelves evidently waiting to be reborn! I've received inquires from many states including Puerto Rico. About 4 months ago, I found one here in Raleigh, NC made in 1912 with a broken belt. I was able to make a leather belt for it with the help of a machinist friend of mine. Then, I decided to try listing the belt on Ebay and was surprised by the response. Then, I made a BIG mistake, I sold the machine to my friend. His wife is sewing with it! However, I no longer had the machine to test belts I was making and some came back to me that had failed. So, I looked for another 95-1 on Ebay and got lucky to find one a few weeks ago with an intact belt. At the same time, I canceled my Ebay lsiting to wait for the machine to arrive tinking it would have a leather timing belt. However, the belt in my new/old 95-1 turned out to not be made out of leather...it was made of a tough, non-stretchy gasket type material. I have located a source for this material and my machinist friend is now reworking the jig to use to this new material to make the belts. These "new and improved" belts will well outlast a leather belt because they will be impervious to oil. Within a few weeks I'll be back here to announce the new belts. Please stay tuned! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
