Adler 268 driven roller foot

[Gia]

Hello everyone,

I have a great deal for an Adler 268 FA-3S which looks flawless, comes with Efka servo, pneumatic foot lift and automatic thread cutting. It’s a wonderfull piece, except that  it doesn’t have a driven roller foot, it’s a simple one. I would like to have triple transport but driven roller would work just fine.
By reading its brochure, I saw that the driven roller foot was optional. So I’m thinking about replacing it but I’m not sure if its mechanism allows me to do that. 
I somebody here has this machine, I kindly ask them to help me find out if the replacement of the roller foot with a driven one is possible, or it was just a factory option. 
Thank you in advance!

Gia

[Gia]

Ok.. Probably I won't buy this machine because I'm not sure if the simple roller foot will be enough for medium to heavy leather. However, the machine it's simply beautiful, in perfect condition, with all the functions working

[RockyAussie]

I have one with the driven roller foot but I have had plenty of other machines with roller feet that are not driven as well and at the end of the day I believe that it does not make much difference. Because the driven roller foot cant spin backwards sometimes seems to hamper going around tight curves but not much of a problem. I used to get pissed off about missed stitches on it at times but later found out that the minimum needle size is 18 and I until then had been using mostly 16. Now missed stitching is rare. I use this machine for stitching my dress belts mostly but it gets used for stitching in zips into our circular coin purses which you can see in this video I made ages ago.

 

[Gia]

13 hours ago, RockyAussie said:

I have one with the driven roller foot but I have had plenty of other machines with roller feet that are not driven as well and at the end of the day I believe that it does not make much difference. Because the driven roller foot cant spin backwards sometimes seems to hamper going around tight curves but not much of a problem. I used to get pissed off about missed stitches on it at times but later found out that the minimum needle size is 18 and I until then had been using mostly 16. Now missed stitching is rare. I use this machine for stitching my dress belts mostly but it gets used for stitching in zips into our circular coin purses which you can see in this video I made ages ago.

 

Thanks for reply!

How thick is the leather you use, and you tried to sew with 270 thread?
 My projects will include 6mm leather thickness  and I'd like to know if I can achieve that with this machine.

And btw, what's the subclass of your machine?

Edited August 24, 2020 by Gia

[RockyAussie]

It can go up to 7mm ok but that is not common in my use. I looked up to find a bit on the sub classes and found some info on this site - http://www2.duerkopp-adler.com/export/sites/duerkoppadler/commons/download/public/268/B_268_EN.pdf

My sub class is 268 - VG-3-S and if you look in the pdf  file you can see that the 268 - FA -3-S is very similar except that mine is limited to a 4.5mm stitch length and yours can go to 6mm stitch length.

 NOTE: both of these versions only have a needle range going from 18/110 to 22/140 and that means that the biggest thread would be 138 (20m).

I will attach a couple of pictures for you where I am sewing some stiff veg at around 7mm with a 110 needle which is all I have here at the moment I think.

[Gia]

On 8/25/2020 at 2:36 AM, RockyAussie said:

It can go up to 7mm ok but that is not common in my use. I looked up to find a bit on the sub classes and found some info on this site - http://www2.duerkopp-adler.com/export/sites/duerkoppadler/commons/download/public/268/B_268_EN.pdf

My sub class is 268 - VG-3-S and if you look in the pdf  file you can see that the 268 - FA -3-S is very similar except that mine is limited to a 4.5mm stitch length and yours can go to 6mm stitch length.

 NOTE: both of these versions only have a needle range going from 18/110 to 22/140 and that means that the biggest thread would be 138 (20m).

I will attach a couple of pictures for you where I am sewing some stiff veg at around 7mm with a 110 needle which is all I have here at the moment I think.

Beautiful machine, thanks for all the info.

'Mine' has quiet DC motor, same as my Adler 269, (pic bellow) with functions: pressure foot lift, thread cutting, needle positioner. The price of the machine is 800 euros, and it is still available but my only problem is if the simple roller foot can transport many layers of leather.

[RockyAussie]

10 hours ago, Gia said:

The price of the machine is 800 euros, and it is still available but my only problem is if the simple roller foot can transport many layers of leather.

Sounds like a bargain. Just about any machine can have trouble with multiple layers depending on how they are stacked and held together and so on. For example depending on the work and the desired quality of the finished job multiple layers that go from thick to thin to thick etc means that the thread tension really needs to sometimes be tighter and looser as well and that can be an issue for sure. It would help if you could show a picture of the type of work you want to do with it I think. I find this machine good for a lot of things but the height of the post is not high enough for tall bags of some types and things like that need to be be considered. The needle positioner and presser foot lift would be very useful to have with multiple layers for sure.