Sew and Fix · Home sewing machine faults, in the right order
Skipped stitches, a nest of thread underneath, fabric that won't move: most of these come down to threading, the needle, the bobbin or lint. Work through those in order before you touch the tension dial or book a repair.
Each step is quick and costs little or nothing. Test on a scrap after each one.
What the stitches are doing tells you where to look. Most of it is threading, needle or lint long before it is the machine.
Top-loading or front-loading, Class 15 or Class 66, and the first seam on a machine fresh out of the box.
Jersey, denim, leather, chiffon and quilt sandwiches. The right needle fixes more faults than the tension dial does.
Lint, the oil question (many modern machines want none), the WD-40 mistake, and when it is time for a service.
Keep the checks by the machine: download the free Sew and Fix fault-finding checklist. It's the same order as above, on one page.