Sunday, July 1, 2018

Fixing a Bird's Nest

My Pfaff 1222E was working just fine---until it wasn't. All of a sudden, I had a "bird's nest" on the underside of my stitching.  When the bird's nest is on the bottom, it means there's something wrong with the upper tension.

First, I completely unthreaded my machine with the presser foot up, then re-threaded it without threading the needle. I pulled on the thread and it moved easily through the machine.

Next, I lowered the presser foot and pulled on the thread. I met with resistance. So that was good.
I tried stitching my fabric, but I still had a bird's nest.

Next, I changed out the needle. No change.

I changed out the spool of thread, thinking it might be a mismatch between the spooled thread and the bobbin thread. It seemed to me that the labels on the top and bottom of the spool were affecting the free flow of the thread. There was a slight improvement, but the bird's nest was still appearing intermittently.

Finally, I thought about what I had been sewing before the bird's nest happened. I had used a zig zag stitch. So I cycled through the zig zag stitches (a large zig zag and a small zig zag) and attempted a button hole. It was a fail.

I then went past the 4mm stitch on my dial---it's a very small zig zag. I didn't get any bird's nests!

I then tried straight stitching and everything looks beautiful again!

If this hadn't fixed it, my baby was going to the machine doctor. I hope this helps someone else!