tension?

Hi Stella,

Sorry to hear you are still having problems. You can check the cams on the underside of the carriage. If you take the carriage off the machine and turn it over, when you turn the tension dial you should be able to see two of the cams moving. They govern how far the needles move to make the size of stitch and should be clean and lightly oiled.

When you thread up the yarn through the tension discs on the yarn brake, have the tension set to about the middle position on the + - dial to start with. Don't wind the yarn round the disc but just make sure it passes between the discs and under the little pin at the back between the discs. Also make sure there is no build up of fibres between and behind the discs.

Make sure the yarn is feeding smoothly from the cone or ball. If you are using hand-knitting yarn, you will need to rewind it with a wool winder so that it will feed through quickly enough without catching. It should feed from the centre without the ball of yarn jumping off the floor.

For 4 ply a setting of 5 or 6 is a good starting point on the carriage tension dial. If you use hand-knitting yarn you may need a looser tension as it is spun with a tighter twist. It is not recommended to use hand-knitting yarn but is best to use a cone which has been produced for machine-knitting. This has a looser twist and feeds off the cone, which should ideally be standing on the floor behind the machine table, much more smoothly.

Let me know if this helps.
Kind regards,

Sue
January 2013