Singer 111W155 presser foot adjustment

[Uwe]

Ouch, that was probably a mistake, I'm sorry to say.  That is one setting that almost never needs to be (or should be) adjusted after the machine leaves the factory, unless you replace the main shaft. Press the "undo" button. 

[Ole South]

Wish I could... manual says it's to change the lift ratio between vibrating foot and outside presser foot.  I suspect it's the correlation between both the eccentric and the pivot pin adjustment.

[Uwe]

Now I'm really curious. Can you post a picture or scan of that section in the manual? 

[Ole South]

Page 17 of Singer-Class-111-Instructions

[Uwe]

Well, I learned something new today. Thank you for prompting that lesson, Ole South!  I take back what I said earlier - what you did was not some grave mistake. I was thinking of the other almost-but-not-quite identical machines in that class (e.g. Consew 225, which has a different mechanism for foot lift height adjustment.)

The relative foot lift height is adjusted similar to what I described above in the 1. 2. 3. step picture, but the total foot lift is indeed adjusted via that worm screw on the eccentric on the main shaft. 

There are various scans of that manual floating around, some of them with really poor picture scans. Here's one that has very good detail in the pictures: Singer Class 111 Instructions.pdf , just so we all look at the same instructions.

I just pulled out my SInger 111W155 project machine to take a closer look. I'll report back.

 

[Uwe]

I was able to get my machine to bind and stop turning over just by adjusting it to max foot lift (turning the worm screw counter-clockwise all the way after loosening set screw.)

I had taken my machine head apart a few days ago for cleaning, so I know for sure nothing else was interfering. You don't have to take your machine head apart to fix the bind, I just took the pictures like this to show only the parts that matter.

Of course you can also back off the foot lift adjustment worm screw a little bit until there is no more bind. The adjustment shown below should avoid the possibility of dialing in a foot lift amount that causes a bind condition. 

Here's the picture of how my machine bound up at max foot lift and how I fixed it.

Timing-wise, when the main shaft points straight down  (blue line), the foot lift arm should be in its right-most position (yellow arrow). This should give you equal foot lift 

This is also where the foot lift arm may touch the housing and cause a bind condition (red star). There should be a tiny gap between the foot lift arm and housing in this position.

Fix:

1. Loosen the screw (purple arrow)

2. Turn the handwheel until the main shaft points straight down (blue line)

3. Adjust foot lift arm to have a tiny gap to housing

4. Tighten screw (purple arrow)

Turn the hand wheel  a full turn to verify fix 

[Ole South]

How does the presser foot rise relative to the vibrating foot?  The problem I'm seeing is that when I get the vibrating foot rising 1/4-1/2" the presser foot barely lifts.

But I will try this tomorrow.

 

Thank you so much for all this!

Edited March 1, 2017 by Ole South

[Uwe]

The above adjustment should also equalise foot lift. Try the adjustment above and then check if foot lift is equalized.

If not, try these steps:

1. Turn the handwheel until tip of descending needle is level with top of throat plate

2. Loosen purple arrow screw (Both feet will drop to be level with throat plate)

3. Tighten purple-arrow screw again.

4. Verify full turn with no bind

In a well-adjusted walking foot machine everything lines up at the top of throat plate level at the exact same time in the cycle. That's the standard adjustment. 

A you turn the handwheel, when the tip of the descending needle is level with the top of the throat plate, the ascending feed dog is also level with top of throat plate. Both Presser feet are level with top of throat plate.

 

 

I show this foot lift equalizing step on a Juki LU-563 in this video starting at the 4:00 minute mark:

 

[Ole South]

I think I've a different problem. When decending needle is level with the top of the throat plate the feed dogs have risen and are ready to begin their back stroke; if I drop the presser feet by loosening the screw, further handwheel motion causes the eccentric toggle (top of the L pivot bar, green line) to bind on THE OUTSIDE PRESSER BAR rather than the casting.  Could this be a top end / bottom end timing issue?

Note: vibrating foot lifts 1/2", outside presser only lifts 1/16".

Edited March 2, 2017 by Ole South

[brmax]

Many times because these presser feet bars and needle bars have a spring and pressure on them one needs to put a spacer under the lower one then release the tension/adjustment lock srew. This helps sometimes as they both work off each other when walking. So getting a reasonable equal foot height here sure is the ticket  

Floyd