Post bed machine

[Azurela]

Hi, all!

I am looking for recommendation - I'm a sewist from Bulgaria

I sew mostly clothing types of things - and one led to another - I found out about barefoot minimalistic shoes (like the rabaukowitsch barfoots pattern)-

and now I am on the bandwagon on sewing my own shoes all the time (and probably for my kids too, until they have another opinion on the matter).

I sew them from (mostly) woven wrap scraps and leather (real or not). Most are turned shoes (like the Beckett boot pattern), but my machine is having trouble to sew through ticker soling.

And I stumbled upon these post bed machines. I can afford to get a new SG Gemsy 2000-6 C, but as I have never used such type of machine and there is no one near me, that I can go to try it out-

I'm here to ask for your help and opinions - Will she be working for me or I don't need it? Can you actually sew with it - all clips that I see - they use it mostly for topstitching- so I can't really wrap my head around.

Would I be able to sew the soles into the shoes easily, or to sew the whole shoes on it?
TIA,
Ana

[arashikage]

These machines are best suited for sewing lighter things like shoe uppers, bags, & hats. It would not be a good choice for sewing soles. What material are you using and how thick? 

[Azurela]

1 hour ago, arashikage said:

These machines are best suited for sewing lighter things like shoe uppers, bags, & hats. It would not be a good choice for sewing soles. What material are you using and how thick? 

I'm using 1 layer of leather, no more than 2mm, one layer of fabric and if I could a layer of rubber - between 3mm and 4mm, the whole sole shouldn't be more than 6-7mm in total. So you can actually sew with those machines?

These are the parts that I wonder if I can or need this machine for - I'm mostly afraid it would be to heavy leather machine and my stuff isn't so "heavy" - sewing the mudguard, heel caps, tongues and the midsole .

Edited January 28, 2020 by Azurela
attaching pictures

[Ferg]

I have a Cowboy Post Bed. They will sew using thread #33 - #138. Mine has almost all movable points with a sealed ball bearing making this a very quiet machine.

Maximum under the foot of mine is about 5/16" and maybe 3/8" some times. I wouldn't recommend trying to sew "hard" leather with it. 

Absolutely amazing to sew hats and shoe uppers or anything else that has finish sewing inside an article.

Won't do shoe soles. It simply isn't configured to do so. Mine has top and bottom roller feed and I love it.

Bob at Toledo, set mine up for what I wanted to do with it. I have changed the upper tension to accommodate different thread size with absolutely no problems.

There is a specific type of sewing machine to do shoe soles. Very expensive and they begin at about 600 pounds.

Ferg

[arashikage]

@Azurela it will certainly sew the areas in the first pic. Unfortunately it will not do the rubber of the sole. Even a stiff leather sole would be too much for it. And like Ferg said an outsole stitcher is a giant and heavy machine and definitely not designed for home use. However if you could find something like a "Junker and Ruh sd28" that would work for what you want to do. I'm not sure of their availability in Bulgaria though.