Help me with my Singer 14u12a

[abrogard]

I am very much a novice at everything.
We have this overlocker.
Very mysterious.  Because sometimes it runs a long stretch of nice overlock and then another day it doesn't.
So two questions:
1.  The three tension wheels:  their adjustment is limited to when that indicator bar is out of sight - i.e. a quarter turn up, a quarter turn down.  or one makes repeated turns of them?  They do turn and turn and turn. The point is - should we do it?  Can't take a note of the setting as we're so often told to do (us novices) if we turn and turn for who's to know how many turns we made?
2.  When the machines gives a nice long run and then 'throws'  a few stitches and like that - what's possibly wrong and what to do?

[Kad]

Do you have the manual for the machine? If not it's available on manuals.co.uk, pages 10/11 tell you how to set up the tension for both needle and loopers.

I just searched for Singer 14u12 manual.

[Bodgeitandscarper]

If it works ok sometimes, then you shouldn't need to adjust the tension.  Working one day and not the next suggests it's not the adjustments or a mechanical issue, but more than likely electrical.  Or did you mean it it does work, but doesn't sew very nicely?

[Ouryve]

You might need to adjust the tension for different fabrics but not for the same fabric with the same thread.


First, check you have nice fresh needles and you have threaded in the correct order.


For remembering the settings, I see from googling that the coloured parts of the wheels have faint lines. I would make sure these are visible - use a sharpie, if you have to - then, even though there are no numbers to go by, you can take a photo and use that as a reference.

[WildAtlanticWay]

As @Ouryve say, new needles and check tension for different fabric combinations.

Often just changing the needles can resolve simple stitching problems and I’ll often do this before faffing with the tension.