Husband considering buying Elna 2130 as present

Hi Jim,

Just out of curiosity, where in the UK are you? There are a few UK ppl here who could recommend dealers etc.

For sewing machine reviews then

is good. Unfortunately for prices quoted in the reviews you just replace the $ with a £ :(

On secondhand or even better - previously loved machines, second hand doesn't have to mean that its oldfashioned etc. I bought my wonderful Husqvarna Lily 545 for £500 as opposed to around £700 new. Its only 12-18 months old and the dealer had serviced it etc. AND I still got to go on one of their free owner's courses. It is worth finding a dealer that offers owner's courses, its a great way to get to know your machine. I love my Lily and would recommend it to anyone and it doesn't feel 2nd hand.

When I was looking at machines, I found that the price ranges of machines were £100 - £130 for very basic, cheap machines (I already had one of those and its horrible) and then to really step up it was more like £250-£350.

The other things is that your wife may find that she gets more use out of snazzy features like fancy stitches than she first thinks. For example, my Lily has letter stitches. These have gone down very well with my 9 yr old daughter :)

I would also suggest that she makes a list of her least favourite sewing tasks. For me, they would be handsewing hems, hand sewing buttons, buttonholes. So I appreciated the one-step buttonhole, the widget for machine sewing buttonholes and the blind hem stitch and foot of my machine.

Another thing about dealers is that they may offer a loyalty scheme which gives you a discount off accessories such as feet. My dealer has a scheme were all owners get 10% almost everything they sell (inc. fabric and notions) but for £20 a year you get 25% of feet and other machine accessories.

HTH

Emma

even if you have to hog tie her up to get her into the car, do so. It is like driving a car. The controls just don't feel right on some models, and on others they are perfect for you, but not perfect for your friend.

The things I recomend that my beginner students have on their machine are:

--straight stitch, (all of them do)

--zig zag ( most do)

--tripple zig zag, this takes an extra stitch in the middle of the zig.

--a blind hem stitch

--ability to move needle position, even if you only get 2 choices, like left and center. left center and right is best, and it is better if there are 5 or more positions. but at least two choices.

--A one step buttonhole. You don't always have this choice here, but do not get one where you have to turn the fabric around to do the second side of the buttonhole. This is way frustrating. If you get a multi step button hole, I much prefer the one that goes backwards back to the beginning for the second side. I had one student that never did get the hang of the needle positions and turning the fabric for his machine. He could not think in reverse, or what ever skill is needed to think this way.

I don't even bother with stretch stitches, they just put too many stitiches into an area, my opinion. SandyE

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Thanks for helpful advice and web-link. Many thanks

Jim