I have two old sewing machines, I picked both up at the local refuse transfer station. One is a 1920s Singer. It’s super basic, doesn’t even have a reverse, but it’s bullet proof. It’s cast iron but a portable model, so it’s built in to a carry case and weighs ‘only’ 20ish kg.
The second is a Toyota Jigline. It’s from the 70s and is mostly stainless steel. It has multiple stitch patterns but the pattern selector has the only plastic gear in the entire machine and it’s cracked. It still works fine but I’ll have to replace it at some point. At least I can see and understand the entire mechanism.
The Toyota was cheap but the Singer was around market price. The Toyota was marked as not worked but with a liberal application of machine oil it came free. There are plenty of guides online for fixing up machines.
> "One is a 1920s Singer. It’s super basic, doesn’t even have a reverse, but it’s bullet proof."
That goes for much earlier models too. Recently, during a factory clean-up, I came across a Singer that predates yours by some 50 years—it was made in the early 1870s—1874 to be precise—and it too was built out of cast iron and made to last seemingly for ever (it was still quite functional).
Incidentally, you can tell the date of your Singer easily by by checking the many Singer serial number databases on the Web. Here's a couple to start with:
The second is a Toyota Jigline. It’s from the 70s and is mostly stainless steel. It has multiple stitch patterns but the pattern selector has the only plastic gear in the entire machine and it’s cracked. It still works fine but I’ll have to replace it at some point. At least I can see and understand the entire mechanism.
The Toyota was cheap but the Singer was around market price. The Toyota was marked as not worked but with a liberal application of machine oil it came free. There are plenty of guides online for fixing up machines.