Teaching Quilting

This is kind of a test message, as I am setting up thunderbird for
reading news groups, and seeing if it is "better" than XPN newsreader.

Well, anyway, this video, from man sewing, one of my favorite you tube
channels (perhaps I will do a future post about it):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfNGfTmSWSU, and in it Rob Appell, the
host of the show, helps his daughter with making a doll quilt. I
personally think he did a little too much, though.

There is also this video about how the Janome 2212 is the best machine
for beginners: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDPZXQLHtuQ. There are
also lots of others that talk about the best machine for beginners as well.

This got me to wondering something that is sort of a hypothetical
question for me, but might be more something that one of you has actual
experience with.

Suppose you are teaching a teenager how to sew or quilt, and one day his
parents come to you and say that they want to get him a sewing machine
for his birthday, with you being the technical person, and them
supplying the money, with a budget of up to $200.

Would you recommend an older machine such as a singer featherweight or
301, or a newer "beginner" machine like the Janome 2212 (the 2212 is not
a "toy" machine, as I would never even consider a "toy" machine in this
situation).

I have a singer featherweight, which is kinda my "inheritance" from my
late mother. I love it, and I have a buttonhole attachement for it
which makes really nice buttonholes, and a bunch of presser feet for
various things, of which I have only used the "regular" one and the 1/4"
foot, but otherwise it is limited to straight stitching.

I also have a new home from the early 60's (I think), that is a really
nice machine that is a zig-zag machine.

I would also like a singer 301, though I really don't know what I would
do with a 3rd machine.

So if I were buying the machine for myself, I would choose an older
machine, specifically a Singer 301. For the teenager, however I might not.

The 301 (or a featherweight) is probably the better built machine, as
there is a reason they have been around since the 50's (I think), or, in
the case of the featherweight, the 40's or earlier.

However, the newer machine, the 2212, has several advantages as well:

I have heard that threading the machine is a bit easier and more
"foolproof" on newer machines, and I don't mean just threading the
needle, though some newer machines have an attachment for automatically
doing that as well. I mean getting the thread through the tension disks
and the tension lever is easier.

Most general purpose machines today (and the 2212 in particular) have a
freearm. I have never used a freearm, but I think they would come in
quite handy if the machine was used primarily for garment construction.
I don't think they would be very useful for quilting.

There is nothing new about freearms as there is a model of the Singer
Featherweight (222) that has one, but I think the newer the machine, the
more likely it is to have one, and a 301 definitely does not, I don't
think. Heck, there might even be model of treadle made with a freearm.

The buttonhole attachement is probably easier to use than the one for
the featherweight. The featherweight attachment makes really nice
buttonholes, but I had a heck of a time getting it set up properly the
first time I used it. The attachement for the 301 looks like it is similar.

The stich selection seems to be simpler on the 2212, and it contains
several decorative stiches as well.

Obviously, a featherweight, since it is limited to straight stiching,
has no decorative stiches. My New Home has decorative stitches, but you
have to mess around with cams for that, and I have never used them
except messing around with them to see what they look like, and the only
one I might use is the one for blind-stitch hemming. If they were
easier to use, though, I might. I don't know about the 301 and
decorative stitches.

Many newer machines, though not the 2212, have a drop in bobbin, which I
am told is easier to use than a front-loading bobbin. Winding a bobbin
is still a pain in the royal butt (M*A*S*H fans might get that
reference), so the availability of prewound bobbins for the machine you
are considering might also be a factor.

There are probably other differences to consider as well, but those seem
to be most of the advantages of a newer machine over an older one.

There are other, even simpler machines out there, but some appear to be
too simple to go much past beginner level sewing. The 2212 looks like
it could go well past beginner level sewing.

Brian Christiansen (I hope my name does not appear twice, as thunderbird
is supposed to automatically attach it, but I am not sure if I have it
set up correctly as it does not appear in the message I am typing.)