So you just purchased a walking foot sewing machine, maybe even our TuffSew Straight Stitch. Congratulations!!  If you did in fact order our TuffSew Straight Stitch, you will notice that your machine will be all stitched in, ready to go upon arrival. 

The tension is set, the needle is placed, and a sample material has been sewn already. So you crank out all your initial sewing projects- but now might be wondering “how do I maintain this machine now?”

The first item we’d like to discuss is oiling the machine. This TuffSew Straight Stitch machine is a portable walking foot sewing machine. It does not sit in a bed of oil like full sized industrial sewing machines do. 

Therefore the Straight Stitch needs to be manually oiled every month. Just like in the YouTube video below, simply tilt the machine on its back (careful it’s heavy) and oil all the moving joints. You can use the oiling tube that came with the machine. As you turn the hand wheel you can see all of these moving joints-simple as that.

Tension is another issue we combat. You’ll see the circular tension knob on the machine with numbers on it. Before we shipped your new TuffSew machine out to you-we calibrated the machine and set the tension to 5. 

Always make sure you have the tension set to 5. If you are deciding to sew light-weight materials on our Straight Stitch machine-feel free to lower the tension a little bit. However, when you are done sewing the light weight materials make sure and reset the tension knob to 5.

We also get a lot of questions on needle insertion. So you want to change the needle or take it out-no problem. Simply loosen the black set screw on the side needle mechanism 1/2 turn. Then you can drop the needle down and take it out. Make sure when you replace the needle that you notice there are 2 sides to our needles. 

One side has a long 1” groove on the side of the needle. The other side of the needle has a little scarf on it. When you put the needle in the machine you ALWAYS want to make sure the long 1” groove is facing the left side of the machine.

 You can feel the groove with your fingernail. Remember if you put the needle in backwards-the machine won’t sew L.

If you have any further questions on maintaining your sewing machine, feel free to email us at [email protected]

If you are still on the fence about ordering a TuffSew Straight Stitch, see our TuffSew Reviews page.