As you know, I'm very distrustful of electricity but enjoy sewing and have some very nice fabrics just now, together with some "retro" patterns for garments displaying an appropriate level of modesty.
There are two sewing machines, one is the 1888 model which I prefer, the other from 1923 with a full set of original attachments. Both are treadle operated. Modern machines (apart from breaking in less than a century) for different stitch types move the needle around. This makes the innards unnecessarily complicated and there's not much room for adjustment. Earlier designs instead have "attachments" attached on where the needle is to move the material around.
The 1888 model has screw adjustments requiring about ¼ to ⅓ of a turn every ten years or so. There's about 2” of adjustment available of which maybe ⅛” has been used up so far. Up until around the 1890s the treadle was linked to the wheel driving the belt (belts are still available) with a wooden rod. I much prefer this to the later metal rod because as it wears all that's needed is a small piece of wood, hornbeam is ideal and I grow these just in case but so far it looks good, which brings me to the attachments.
They are well made and quite robust but do have delicate parts which are very difficult to replace. For example, if one fell on the floor and was walked on, a bit could break off or become twisted. How should I approach this? Both machines are now out of warranty.