Pleased to announce I have bought the Janome and it could be here by the weekend
He also demonstrated a similarly priced Britannia machine, a brand I hadn't heard of, it was heavier and looked bulkier but had many of the same features as the Janome, he sewed through eight thicknesses of denim to show how robust it was.
I got the replacement foot pedal for the Alfa only to find when we got home it had the wrong size 3 pin connector to the machine. Of goes the boy wonder to town again and came back with the correct one, they had given me the pedal for the newer machines not the old style.
4" off my hair now it is a bit like Esme's of GBSB but not so severe looking, same colour though