Feed Lifting Rock Shaft (FLRS) Reassembly

Hello everyone.  I sincerely apologize for my overly extended absence.  I could go into the details as to why, but that would be boring.  Instead we’ll just jump right into the reassembly of Ms. Rusty!

We left off last time installing the Connecting Rods.  The next step I tackled was the Feed Lifting Rock Shaft, or FLRS as I affectionately call it.  The next two photos show all the pieces/parts needed to install the FLRS.

All the individual parts 

Parts laid out in approximately correct location when assembled. It took me a bit to figure this out as I’ve been away from Ms. Rusty for so long!

The first step is putting one half of the feed dog raising mechanism on the left end of the shaft as shown below – be sure to put it on facing the right way (screw toward the inside of the machine)

The mechanism at the right end of the FRLS (Feed Lifting Rock Shaft) is used to raise or lower the feed dogs.  The pictures below show the position of the second half (front/left half) )when the feed dogs are raised and lowered.  Honestly, I’m not sure which one is represents raised or lowered.  I could make an educated guess, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out after the feed dogs are installed.  The screws will also have to be adjusted a bit after the feed dogs are in to make sure they are at the correct height for sewing.

View from left 

View from right

At this point the rod is ready to put into the base of the machine. Lay the machine on its side with the bottom facing you and the balance wheel end to the right.  The FLRS attaches to the top legs in the base. Put the two “pointy” screws partially into the legs on the machine base on both the right and left side.  The photo below shows a “pointy” screw in the right leg of the base.

Place the FLRS bar between the screws and tighten a bit.  You don’t want the bar too tight, just enough to hold it, as you need some room so you can attach it to the connecting rod. Attach the end of the feed connecting rod (installed here) to the FLRS via the taper hole.  The connecting rod should be towards the balance wheel and the nut towards the bobbin area (see photo below). 

Tighten or adjust the end nuts and taper nuts as needed so when the balance wheel is turned by hand the connecting rod doesn’t bind or drag, nor have too much play.  It isn’t too hard to do this.  It’s pretty obvious that you need to move/adjust the FLRS one way or the other if you can’t even get the connecting rod to butt up against the taper hole.  This is what happened to me on my first try.  Once I had things lined up right, everything just slid into place.  After that, only minor adjustments were needed to make it rotate smoothly.  It seemed to me that if it didn’t feel/look right, it probably wasn’t right. 

Here is a photo of the bottom side of Ms. Rusty with the FLRS fully installed.

Feed Rock Shafts

First let me start by saying I learned a LOT taking these two shafts out. I learned 1) that the names of these two bars/shafts are so similar that I was getting them confused, 2) how NOT to take out the shafts, and 3) its much easier to take out the second shaft after learning 1 and 2!

Here is a picture of what I started with:

Lesson #1:  The top shaft is called the Feed Lifting Rock Shaft and the bottom shaft is called the Feed Rock Shaft.  From this point forward I’m going to abbreviate them FLRS and FRS, or Top Bar and Bottom Bar, because that’s what I ended up calling them in my head to keep them straight because it took me way too long looking at the Adjuster’s Manual for me to figure out that they even had different names.  For a while I was calling them both “rocker bars” and then thoughts of ‘80’s Big Hair bands flashed through my head, and then……well, I digress.  In the end I disregarded what the Adjuster’s Manual said and just dove in because I was getting too confused.

I first I took LOTS of pictures, because I’m sure I’ll forget something along the way and putting it back together might be a bear.  However, I won’t bore you with the 20+ photos I took from every angle and I’ll just show you the pertinent ones along the way.

My first goal was taking off the feed lifting crank from the FLRS, or top bar.  A front and rear picture of this gizmo is shown below.

I began by removing the ‘feed lifting rock shaft crank clamping screw’ and then attempted to loosen the lifting crank thumbscrew, but it wouldn’t budge.  After trying several other screws in the area, and discovering they were all locked up due to rust or old grease, I sprayed Break Away on each and every joint and screw under the machine.  I suppose one could also use WD-40 or something similar, but this happens to be what I had on hand.

After several applications over a period of a few hours I finally was able to loosen the thumb screw.  Then I removed the screw on the feed lifting crank itself and with a little wiggling took off the crank assembly (see below).  For clarity, I the tag LHS means the side that can be seen when looking at the machine from the front end, or left side of machine.  RHS means view from right hand side, or balance wheel side of machine.

Then came the real fun – remove the FLRS or top bar.  I started by removing the center end screws/nuts from both the front and rear of the top bar.  Here is a picture before the disassembly process showing the center screw/nut on the top and the connecting rod screw below it. 

At this point the top bar is attached to the machine only by the connecting rod.  This means the rod is flopping around attached only by one screw.  That doesn’t allow one much leverage to remove that dang connecting rod screw, which doesn’t budge for me (of course). 

After busting a knuckle open trying alternatives, I figured out the only way to get any leverage is to reconnect the bar using the center screws.  After reattaching the screws, it was fairly easy to remove the connecting rod screw (big surprise).  Then I had to removed the center screws, again, and then the bar was free!

Lesson #2:  Remove the connecting rod screw FIRST and the center screw/nuts SECOND.

After the top bar was removed, I could slide off the thumb screw part of the feed lifting crank.

 

Here is picture under Ms. Rusty without her top bar, or FLRS, or whatever you want to call it

Lesson #3:  It took me 2 evenings, or several hours to remove, the top bar, but less than 10 minutes to remove the bottom bar (feed rock shaft).

I started by removed the screw and nut from the feed forked connection rod

Then I removed the center feed screw/nut.  Here is a photo of just the rear center nut removed and both the screw and nut after removal.

Amazingly the bottom bar just fell out after taking out the front center screw.

While it was frustrating, and I got one skinned knuckle in the process, I learned a lot taking out the feed bars.  I imagine the next steps, taking out the gears and cranks in the head, will be just as much fun.  Stay tuned!

Rotary Hook Drive Shaft Removal

I approached this part of the disassembly with some trepidation, but I’ve run out of all the easy stuff to do.  Before starting I read, and re-read, the Adjuster’s Manual hoping it would be of some help only to find out it was going to be more difficult than anticipated since Ms. Rusty’s gears don’t rotate, making it difficult to access the set screws in most places.
Here is a view of the underside of the Ms. Rusty: 
I removed the Rotating Hook Shaft Bevel Gear Cover on the by taking out 2 gear cover screws.  This cover is on the front end of the machine, on the left hand end of the drive shaft.

Then I removed the back cover (attached with 2 screws) exposing the back bevel gear.

I then loosened 2 set screws at each of the following points -
Front bevel gear -   
Drive shaft collar -  
and back gear hub -
At this point the drive shaft was ‘supposed’ to loose enough to be withdrawn.  Not so in my case So I proceeded to removed all the set screws and applied some lubricant to work into the joints and loosen things up.  While that was working, I moved on to work on the removal of the front gear hoping to make some progress there.
I took off the bevel gear front cover – here is a picture with one of the 2 screws removed:

Fortunately the front bevel gear was loosened up from the drive gear and I could rotate that enough to access both the set screws on the rotary hook bevel gear.  After those two set screws were removed I was able to pull off the rotary hook bevel gear.

This exposed the rotating hook shaft that I then removed from the top of the machine

Well, after lots and lots of lubrication, brake release, elbow grease, removal of the bushing set screws, and help from my husband, I was FINALLY able to break the rotating hook drive shaft free!  I first want to point out a few important ‘landmarks’ before pulling out the drive shaft.
Here is the underside with all the set screws removed 
Rear bushing flat area for set screw -
Divot at right end of rear bushing -
Set screw recess of front taper bushing -
Here are all the parts after removal from the sewing machine:  front bevel gear, front taper bushing, left drive shaft collar, right drive shaft collar, rear bushing, and the drive shaft with rear bevel gear still attached at the top.  Theoretically the rear bevel gear should come off the drive shaft, but even after overnight soaking in kerosene, it still will not come off.  At this point, I’ve stopped trying and have decided to leave it on.

I can’t really tell the difference between the left and right drive shaft collars, but here are pictures of the left and right hand sides of the them for future reference, just in case there is some difference that I can’t pick up at this time.

Here is a picture of the bottom of the machine after the rotary hook drive shaft and respective gears are removed.

I think the next step will be to remove the feed dog shafts.  At that point I should be done with the bottom of the machine and will have to tackle Ms. Rusty’s innards. Oh boy!