Soo Did Y'all Know You Can Get A Soldering Iron For 8 Bucks? I Didn't. I Do Now. I'm About To Burn The

January 13, 2021

Another WitchCrafty reversible plush

some dadmic because it's amazing

Also bonus shinsou:

Sewing Machines & Planned Obsolescence

I've got these two sewing machines, made about 100 years apart. An old treadle machine from around 1920-1930, that I pulled out of the trash on a rainy day, and a new Brother sewing machine from around 2020.

I've always known planned obsolescence was a thing, but I never knew just how insidious it was till I started looking at these two side by side.

I wasn't feeling hopeful at first that I'd actually be able to fix the old one, I found it in the trash at 2 am in a thunderstorm. It was rusty, dusty, soggy, squeaky, missing parts, and 100 years old.

How do you even find specialized parts 100 years later? Well, easily, it turns out. The manufacturers at the time didn't just make parts backwards compatible to be consistent across the years, but also interchangeable across brands! Imagine that today, being able to grab a part from an old iPhone to fix your Android.

Anyway, 6 months into having them both, I can confidently say that my busted up trash machine is far better than my new one, or any consumer-grade sewing machine on the market.

Old Machine Guts

The old machine? Can sew through a pile of leather thicker than my fingers like it's nothing. (it's actually terrifying and I treat it like a power tool - I'll never sew drunk on that thing because I'm genuinely afraid it'd sew through a finger!) At high speeds, it's well balanced and doesn't shake. The parts are all metal, attached by standard flathead screws, designed to be simple and strong, and easily reachable behind large access doors. The tools I need to work on it? A screwdriver and oil. Lost my screwdriver? That's OK, a knife works too.

New Machine Guts

The new machine's skipping stitches now that the plastic parts are starting to wear out. It's always throwing software errors, and it damn near shakes itself apart at top speed. Look at it's innards - I could barely fit a boriscope camera that's about as thick as spaghetti in there let alone my fingers. Very little is attached with standard screws.

And it's infuriating. I'm an engineer - there's no damn reason to make high-wear parts out of plastic. Or put them in places they can't be reached to replace. There's no reason to make your mechanism so unbalanced it's reaching the point of failure before reaching it's own design speed. (Oh yeah there is, it's corporate greed)

100 years, and your standard home sewing machine has gone from a beast of a machine that can be pulled out of the literal waterlogged trash and repaired - to a machine that eats itself if you sew anything but delicate fast-fashion fabrics that are also designed to fall apart in a few years.

Looking for something modern built to the standard that was set 100 years ago? I'd be looking at industrial machines that are going for thousands of dollars... Used on craigslist. I don't even want to know what they'd cost new.

We have the technology and knowledge to manufacture "old" sewing machines still. Hell, even better, sewing machines with the mechanical design quality of the old ones, but with more modern features. It would be so easy - at a technical level to start building things well again. Hell, it's easier to fabricate something sturdy than engineer something to fail at just the right time. (I have half a mind to see if any of my meche friends with machine shops want to help me fabricate an actually good modern machine lol)

We need to push for right-to-repair laws, and legislation against planned obsolescence. Because it's honestly shocking how corporate greed has downright sabotaged good design. They're selling us utter shit, and expecting us to come back for more every financial quarter? I'm over it.

A porcelain moth patch! He’s got a wingspan of about 2 1/2 inches.

Halfway done!!

My friend requested a My Neighbor Totoro quilt for her baby. It’s my first finished quilt ever and I’m super proud of it! Took me 120+ hours to finish it. I hope that baby enjoys tummy time and spitting up on it!

little things that i try to do to get more out of my clothes

Latest and greatest embroidery project yet, complete with bling!

I am so excited to share this, as it's based on gorgeous artwork by @runawaymun that accompanies her fic To Partake, both of which I am asbolutely obsessed with (in case that that wasn't obvious).

I've been wanting to make this ever since I saw the artwork for the Nightingale Pin almost a year ago, but at the time I didn't really have the skills to pull it off. But I kept thinking about it and the bug never left me so here we are :). Of course there are things I would do differently next time, but I love how this came out regardless and I hope it reps the original artwork in some small measure!

I'm so inspired by @runawaymun's fic and art along with all the other writers and artists that post amazing things on this site every day; your talent and creativity makes me want to push my own creative boundaries, and so I have!

Reblog if you're not homophobic

Every url that reblog’s will be written in a book and shown to my homophobic dad. 

ahehehehe!! Weeeeeeeeee!!! ^w^ *holding your hand and skipping with you as we are hunted for sport*