Is the bobbin on the Zest sewing machines just incredibly hard to set up? Or is it broken?

I was at the space last night trying to sew some linen for some dish towels. One of the Zest machines was set up, and the other one had to be set up. My girlfriend was using the set up one and I was going to get the other one going for my own project. We’ve both taken the sewing class but the Zest wasn’t used as the demonstration unit.

I could not for the life of me get that thing to work. I referenced probably five YT videos of it as well as the working machine. As far as I can tell, I had the bobbin set up 100% correctly as well as the needle above it for threading/tension purposes, but it would just not grab the thread from the bobbin. Is it broken? I don’t know enough about sewing machines to say “yes, it should have worked at this point so it’s clearly broken” but it sure seems broken. It was the Zest that was nearest the door as you walk in.

I’ll check it out. You do have to push it in hard enough to hear it click, if that helps.

Hmmm. Well it clicked several times when putting it in after each check on the threading of it but that may have just been the handle thing clicking into the notch. I never really pushed on it per se, just put it on the spindle and moved it so the handle went into the groove thing to secure it in place.

If you got a distinct click, then it was firmly in place. I’m not as accustomed to that type either, and found that you have to make it “snap” before it’s actually in place. I haven’t gotten up to look at it yet though…

Somebody else may have done something. I had the new person set it up. Somebody had left it set up for bobbin winding, and we had to press the hand wheel back into position to run. It’s working now.

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