My Sew Gem, model 215, won't pull up the thread from bobbin. Any advice?
By Roshawn from WA
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Had you just filled a bobbin and maybe forgot to reset the machine to sewing mode?
Is the bobbin case area completely clean of lint and fluff? Is the shuttle firmly seated in the case? Did you thread with the presser foot down? When was the last time you flossed the tension discs?
Is your Sew Gem a vibrating shuttle hand crank or treadle or is your Sew Gem one of the later, electrified ones?
You may need to find someone in your area qualified to work on these if none of the above questions help you solve your problem - your search term might include 'Gellman Mfg Sew Gem vintage electric sewing machine repair' (omit my punctuation) if electrified, use the words hand crank or treadle if not.
The average local sewing machine tech probably won't be able to handle this unless he/she has a fondness for these. Made by Gellman Manufacturing, these are very rare and had some different inner workings than the Singer it so closely resembles.
The company had several patents on their rotary hook mechanisms to improve on the Singer ones and not many repair techs will have the experience to recognise the differences. I'm a self-taught Singer repair tech and if you brought me this machine I wouldn't feel comfortable trying to fix it.
I have one of these I recently acquired. It had the same issue. I do some piddling with sewing machines and I found the problem was that the bobbin shuttle hook was out of time. There is a helical cut gear that drives this and it was slid to the right on the flat of the shaft probably from a jam.
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