COWBOY CB4500/441 NARROW FEED DOG + NEEDLE/THROAT PLATE???

[RockyAussie]

Recently in a post on these sewing machines Solar LeatherMachines, kindly put up a link to their webpage where you could find an English version manual of these sewing machines. http://www.solar-leather.com/supporthelp/

I have been considering making up a narrow dog foot and throat plate to do the finer leather jobs. I tried the narrow slotted plate without feed dog and found several problems, one being that the stitch length dropped back considerably which was not such a big problem but the reverse suddenly went to making no sense at all. I went looking all over the place to find a solution before going to the trouble to make them when I came across this interesting bit on the last page (page 21) in the Instructions Manual & Illustrated Parts Catalogue

#7441-09-0092 Narrow feed dog: work together with 7441-01-0064, for sewing very small borders on hard material, like suit case, furniture, instrumental cases, chairs etc.

7441-01-0064 Narrow throat plate: work together with 7441-09-0092, for sewing very small borders on hard material, like suit case, furniture, instrumental cases, chairs etc.

I have not been able to find any pictures or diagrams of these parts and was hoping someone here may have a set they could post a picture of or have some information about.

Because of the large drop of the dog foot in between stitches I have found that when stitching close to the edge that the job sinks down into the hole and ends up going along like a drunken rocking horse making it quite difficult to keep all lined up nicely. When the edge guide is up close the job wants to come back up and lift the guide which then wrecks the edge coating as well. I have an urgent order to get out this coming week for some personal alarm pouches for one of our correctional centres and this problem showed up whilst I got into stitching them up so I have taken a few pictures to help see the problem with the standard feet I am using. It looks like I will have to sand back and re edge now.The thickness combined is a bit over 4mm or around 10oz and the thread is 20m or 138 if you like and needle is Schmetz size 23 794LR.  I hope that someone here can shed a little light on this and also I would like to ask who else would like a narrow feed dog and throat plate set.

Regards Brian

[brmax]

Interested

You bring up a great task many would like to do.  For myself better, easier and more efficient. 

I followed the leads and yet have not seen a photo either.  In short I took a look at Hightex accessory pics but no luck on these special numbers.  I will have another look around. 

Thanks for the part numbers. 

Floyd

[Uwe]

That is a hard seam to stitch. There's no room on either side, really.

In the short term to get the order out you'll have to use what you have on hand, no time for ordering stuff, really. I'd give the slotted plate (or perhaps raised stirrup plate) another shot and just ignore the reverse lever. Manually position the needle to back up a stitch or two (without turning the material) or finish the seam by hand.  Youtube dude Chechaflo is a master of the manual backstitching technique - his machine has reverse, but he almost never uses it to lock a stitchline.

I'd also tack the layers together with a few drops of superglue and binder clamps - do a bunch and let them sit for half an hour before stitching. No struggle to keep the edges aligned while stitching, allowing you to focus on the stitchline.

The arm-mounted standard edge guided becomes a nuisance when the guide wheel is over the feed dog. Long-term, consider a drop-down guide that is height adjustable and floats above feed dog (or above the bottom layer when attaching that snap flap).

I've never seen the narrow feed dog and throat plate parts referenced in that manual in pictures or real life - they may be hard to source. 

I did order a specialty KH441RG kit last year which is a dedicated 3mm right edge guiding 4-piece set with special feed dog, throat plate and presser feet. It might be an improvement, but you you won't know for sure until you try it. The feed dog on that set is about 6.5mm wide, compared to the standard 8mm wide feed dog.

 

 

Edited September 3, 2017 by Uwe

[brmax]

Uwe thats a nice set,  curious on the feet surface are they smooth, thank you.

Im considering if one were to use that walker foot with the custom inline presser feet that are available. Its close to the same width as walker style. I think i might give that a go for this project with the hi part, One could have the project run on the outside.

Possibly another option is the standard blanket plate and its feed dog. It looks thin but may be to much bite for some materials.

Floyd

[Uwe]

@brmax the feet are smooth on the bottom.  All four pieces are a matched set, you'd have to get them all together. But you can mix and match with other pieces, obviously. 

  

Edited September 3, 2017 by Uwe

[RockyAussie]

Uwe, That looks a lot better than what I have got at present and I have a lot more of these jobs to do yet. How can I buy them? PM me if you prefer. Note I used your timing dial in the first picture. Still have a bit of a problem getting enough length in the backstitching and I wonder if the front plate behind the stitch regulator was flat instead of angled wider at the top would the problem be solved. Thanks and regards Brian

[Uwe]

My KH441RG set has been collecting virtual dust in my ebay store for over a year. I just put it on clearance for half price ($99) a week ago. 

I didn't notice the timing dial when I first looked the pictures . Glad you could use it! The stitch length matching is a balancing act and may indeed need some fussing with the cover plate to make both timing and reverse perfect. 

Edited September 3, 2017 by Uwe

[RockyAussie]

Thanks Uwe, You can post it to me now.

[LeatherLegion]

 

14 hours ago, RockyAussie said:

I have found that when stitching close to the edge that the job sinks down into the hole

I had the same problem stitching some of my wallets with the CB 4500 until i had another needle plate made that was a bit narrower and i shaved off a bit the feed dog to fit properly in it. I am using the same set up as you as far as needle/thread combination and same leather thickness and never had that issue anymore.

3 years ago i posted pictures of the new needle plate and as far as i remember , few forum members  bought them and were happy with the results.They weren't as fancy as the ones posted by Uwe but they work . 

If i were you , i would probably stitched this lot by hand just because there are less then 15 stitches at a time. A Tippman Boss would be great for these

Here are the pictures

 

Edited September 3, 2017 by LeatherLegion

[Uwe]

Got your order @RockyAussie - thanks! It'll go in the mail on Tuesday (Monday is a postal Holiday her in the U.S.)

 

@LeatherLegion thanks for sharing your custom work and pictures! I get the sense there's a need for throat plates with a slim opening and matching feed dogs, especially for use with those skinny harness feet. I'd want to make the feed dog slim enough to leave a very thin wall of material on either side of the needle hole. I'll add it to my list of projects to work on if/when I get my current in-way-over-my-head project machine, a Chiron 5-Axis CNC mill, retrofitted with new motors and controls. 

Edited September 4, 2017 by Uwe

[Darren Brosowski]

The narrow foot set would make life easier as the feet are in line with the needle.

We have these in stock.

 

 

[Uwe]

@Darren Brosowski Do you have any pictures of it mounted to the machine or maybe a video clip of them in action? Price would be cool, too. It's hard to make out details with the strong shadows in that picture. I may have to take skinny inline feet  off my to-do list. 

Edited September 4, 2017 by Uwe

[RockyAussie]

4 hours ago, Darren Brosowski said:

The narrow foot set would make life easier as the feet are in line with the needle.

We have these in stock.

 

 

Thanks for the thought Darren. Are these the feet you sell for stitching around boots and such? In an application where the job is quite stiff I expect these would be handy but the problem I'm having is where the softer leather deflects down the hole at the end of the stitch when the dog foot drops down. I have a couple of more pictures that should show what I am saying more clearly I hope. Be that these look quite bad I have to say after getting the machine all set up and readjusted I have not had one missed stitch or even a knot pull to the top or bottom so far. I might get to like this machine yet. For now until the new dog feet and stuff arrive I have ground and polished the edge of the roller guide to help it not scrape against the edge so badly when the dog foot comes up. I expect to finish this batch of 60 tomorrow and with a bit of luck I will have what I need before the next 200 they want.

First picture shows how the job sits when needle enters.

Second shows how a 2.5mm piece goes down under the needle plate at the end of the stitch when the dog foot goes down

Third picture shows what it does if you are not holding the job in place. As I said like a drunken rocking horse.

Cheers Brian

[RockyAussie]

10 hours ago, LeatherLegion said:

 

I had the same problem stitching some of my wallets with the CB 4500 until i had another needle plate made that was a bit narrower and i shaved off a bit the feed dog to fit properly in it. I am using the same set up as you as far as needle/thread combination and same leather thickness and never had that issue anymore.

3 years ago i posted pictures of the new needle plate and as far as i remember , few forum members  bought them and were happy with the results.They weren't as fancy as the ones posted by Uwe but they work . 

If i were you , i would probably stitched this lot by hand just because there are less then 15 stitches at a time. A Tippman Boss would be great for these

Here are the pictures

 

Thanks for that LeatherLegion. I thought I was going to have to do the same trick but I think this set from Uwe will save me the effort. You must be one hell of a fast hand stitcher. I think I could do the re edging a fair bit faster than I could do it by hand. Can I ask if you shaved any off of the tension disk separator to give a bit of room for the foot to lift without dropping the thread tension?  Most of my other machines allow up to 3mm foot lift before the thread tension gets released.I did and as I stated earlier it enables me to lift the foot a little and  turn corners without getting any bottom loops etc. Regards Brian

[Darren Brosowski]

Silly suggestion maybe but have you tried raising the feed dog?

[LeatherLegion]

3 hours ago, RockyAussie said:

shaved any off of the tension disk separator

I didn't touch anything else ...i know my limitations...lol...

[brmax]

I went back and re read the post and as always learned more. 

Good pickup Darren

On my behalf, im on this labor day Holiday stretching for an excuse.

( cough cough Im readjusting mine a bit )

Here goes: the walker foot recently mounted has the raised area for thread stitch bury.  Anyway I thought it worthy on holiday here. Thanks for the tip, Cheers!

Floyd

Edited September 4, 2017 by brmax

[Darren Brosowski]

On 9/3/2017 at 6:56 PM, RockyAussie said:

Recently in a post on these sewing machines Solar LeatherMachines, kindly put up a link to their webpage where you could find an English version manual of these sewing machines. http://www.solar-leather.com/supporthelp/

I have been considering making up a narrow dog foot and throat plate to do the finer leather jobs. I tried the narrow slotted plate without feed dog and found several problems, one being that the stitch length dropped back considerably which was not such a big problem but the reverse suddenly went to making no sense at all. I went looking all over the place to find a solution before going to the trouble to make them when I came across this interesting bit on the last page (page 21) in the Instructions Manual & Illustrated Parts Catalogue

#7441-09-0092 Narrow feed dog: work together with 7441-01-0064, for sewing very small borders on hard material, like suit case, furniture, instrumental cases, chairs etc.

7441-01-0064 Narrow throat plate: work together with 7441-09-0092, for sewing very small borders on hard material, like suit case, furniture, instrumental cases, chairs etc.

I have not been able to find any pictures or diagrams of these parts and was hoping someone here may have a set they could post a picture of or have some information about.

Because of the large drop of the dog foot in between stitches I have found that when stitching close to the edge that the job sinks down into the hole and ends up going along like a drunken rocking horse making it quite difficult to keep all lined up nicely. When the edge guide is up close the job wants to come back up and lift the guide which then wrecks the edge coating as well. I have an urgent order to get out this coming week for some personal alarm pouches for one of our correctional centres and this problem showed up whilst I got into stitching them up so I have taken a few pictures to help see the problem with the standard feet I am using. It looks like I will have to sand back and re edge now.The thickness combined is a bit over 4mm or around 10oz and the thread is 20m or 138 if you like and needle is Schmetz size 23 794LR.  I hope that someone here can shed a little light on this and also I would like to ask who else would like a narrow feed dog and throat plate set.

Regards Brian

Not sure why reverse would play up with the slotted plate as the only change is not using a feed dog. If you have a spare feed dog you can grind the top off it so it fits under the slotted plate and try that.

I know you are handy with a grinder from your work on the 801 roller feet

 

[RockyAussie]

11 hours ago, Darren Brosowski said:

Silly suggestion maybe but have you tried raising the feed dog?

Thanks for the thought again Darren. If I raise the feed dog any higher then it will hit the roller guide.If I then raise the roller guide I am back with he same problem with more of a kangaroo hop thrown in. Are the  7441-09-0092 Narrow feed dog and throat plate 7441-01-0064 Narrow throat plate able to be bought or not? Do you have in pictures of them? I have to say I'm a bit surprised that none of the dealers here have any answers to this as yet. Regards Brian

[RockyAussie]

2 minutes ago, Darren Brosowski said:

Not sure why reverse would play up with the slotted plate as the only change is not using a feed dog. If you have a spare feed dog you can grind the top off it so it fits under the slotted plate and try that.

I know you are handy with a grinder from your work on the 801 roller feet

 

I did consider doing that but the drag of the material over the plate in comparison to the getting the more positive assistance of using the dog foot made me think to look for a better solution. I am a lazy B at times and to be honest and although I could use a smaller machine  I hate changing bobbins which is a big reason for buying this machine. I am 3/4 finished the job here and am still on the same bobbin. Although many here on LW make heavy holsters and saddlery work where these issues would not show up there are also a lot like me that make handbags and wallets and such. Check my followers in my profile if you like.This machine does have the ability to cope with these things easily but I am not sure if the dealers can at the moment. I hope that I am proven wrong. Brian

[brmax]

Would it be correct that the harness feet are more designed for either a narrow feed dog, smooth or toothed. Or actually the sloted plate less any feed dog. Curious

Floyd

[RockyAussie]

I think the feet I have ordered from Uwe will have an advantage in that the left foot being wider will allow a bit more contact on the throat plate and help in keeping the job flatter as well. The way I designed these pouches I contact glue them first then I can flex them over when I run the stitch line down. I will let you know how they go when I receive them. I can only add that I hope Uwe gets some more into stock as I can see quite a few advantages being able to swap around the different feet options etc. Brian

[RockyAussie]

Heres a couple of pics showing what I am describing above. Thankfully this jobs finished for now and 1/2 of the sewing machine cost is now booked out. Hopefully I'll have the new feet and stuff before the next 200 they want. Got 1 week left now to make 50 ring boxes. 

Edited September 6, 2017 by RockyAussie
forgot the pictures

[Darren Brosowski]

On 9/5/2017 at 10:06 AM, RockyAussie said:

Thanks for the thought again Darren. If I raise the feed dog any higher then it will hit the roller guide.If I then raise the roller guide I am back with he same problem with more of a kangaroo hop thrown in. Are the  7441-09-0092 Narrow feed dog and throat plate 7441-01-0064 Narrow throat plate able to be bought or not? Do you have in pictures of them? I have to say I'm a bit surprised that none of the dealers here have any answers to this as yet. Regards Brian

We have not been able to get the narrow plate and feed dog set. Possibly it is a Juki part number that got carried over when the manual was copied?

[RockyAussie]

1 hour ago, Darren Brosowski said:

We have not been able to get the narrow plate and feed dog set. Possibly it is a Juki part number that got carried over when the manual was copied?

Thanks Darren, I would be good to see what they looked like but I have not had any luck finding any pictures. I will advise how the one's I've ordered from Uwe go when I receive them. All else failing I may think about getting some cast if a few here want to notify if they are interested. The site shows over 400 views so far on this post so I guess it may be possible. I think I will be wanting another set as I often chop and grind these things up to suit whatever the job needs.   Regards Brian