REX RX-518 All Metal Construction Portable Professional Grade Desktop Blindstitch, Cuffs, Failling Slack Bottoms, Hemming Dresses, Skirt and Coat Bottoms, Draperies, Negligees, Undergarments, Lapel Padding, Blouses Sleeves Machine, Gray

I am a menswear tailor and this handy little blind hemmer absolutely makes my life so much easier. It has more than paid for itself within the first month. Had a blind hemmer provided to me from one of my contracts and it had to go in for servicing. Couldn't find one to purchase locally so took a chance on Amazon-- was shipped same day as order and arrived next day. Was intended to serve as a back up for the original that was being serviced but this has become my primary machine.

My wife and I were hesitant to purchase this unit because of some of the negative reviews. However, we decided to take a chance anyway. She has over 30 years' sewing experience (both industrial and home sewing), and I have about the same time working in IT. We figured that we could get the thing going between the two of us. What follows are some of the issues we encountered getting the RX-518 to work, and how we overcame them:1. The manual is terrible!This machine came with the worst manual that I have ever seen. Do yourself a favor and immediately throw the manual away before setting up the machine--it'll save you at least an hour's worth of frustration if you do. Watch a few YouTube videos on setting up the machine instead; they'll have you running in just a few minutes. I still rated the RX-515 a solid 5 stars, even though the supplied manual is horrendous, because the machine works so darned well once you get it running!2. I can't get the machine to do straight stitches!Although this is a small machine, it is industrial-grade, designed to provide thousands of trouble-free hours of service. However, the machine will NOT work correctly if there is anything wrong with how it's threaded. The thread must run precisely along the intended path, with no tangles or twists. It has to go through the tension discs correctly, and be routed UNDER the needle. There are some excellent YouTube videos that can show you how to properly thread the machine. It is essential that you get this right!At first, my wife was having problems getting the machine to work right. She thought she had the machine threaded right. For a moment, I was afraid we were going to have to return it. Then she noticed that the thread had worked its way under the cone on the supply reel. She fixed that problem and the machine has run flawlessly ever since.You also have to use the right kind of thread on the machine. The RX-518 only uses "blind-stitch" thread. Most regular sewing thread is too thick, and will not properly feed through the machine. Most serger threads are thin enough to feed properly, but might not be strong enough for blind stitches. Just save yourself a lot of grief, and exclusively use blind stitch thread on your blind-hemmer.That's about all there is to getting the RX-518 up and running. Some people might complain that this is a lot of hassle, but trust me: you won't complain once you see this machine in operation. It can blast out two-feet of perfect blind-stitches in just a couple of seconds. You'll be doing hemming tasks that used to take hours of hand-sewing in just a couple of minutes, and the stitches be flawless. Trust me: you WON'T regret buying the RX-518 Blind Stitch Machine!

This Rex blind-hemmer is everything I needed. Small and portable, it does a fantastic job on light to heavier fabrics. I use it mainly for hemming lined draperies, and it does a fantastic job. East to adjust and to thread. Looks great, giving a professional finish to my home decorating projects.

To begin:The machine itself was incredibly greasy right out of the box. I almost dropped it. It was just COVERED in oil, and there was even a little puddle of oil in the bottom of the bag that the machine itself was packed in.Pretty gross. Came off fine with a rag with rubbing alcohol.Threading it was pretty tough. There's this little wheel you have to get the thread around and it wasn't easy to thread that in. Otherwise setup was easy.Now... using it.This thing has 1 speed, and it's warp 9. And that's just not nice to use. I have curves to go around, I have small areas... I don't need to go 100000 miles an hour.Overall, it wasn't nice to use. It's almost as if it couldn't handle its own speed...It took me 30 minutes to do a 9" section of the hem I was finishing because I had to keep ripping the seem.The thread gets caught on the little feed dog foot that pulls your fabric through, and then the whole thing borks up.The little fork also will catch on random threads, pull them up, and then the feed dog gets caught on those, too."Oh, maybe you misconfigured something, you should go read the table of contents for issues" you might say.Good idea.Maybe it's covered under the issue "Change prizes while the unequal" or possibly "Measure for should send badly".Anyway. The troubleshooting wasn't useful.I messed with the tension, nothing seemed to work.After about 2 hours of trying to get around this hem, the machine started to smoke. Hence the headline.Never did finish my hem.The sections it did correctly looked great, and it was fast and seemed like a time saver.But I guess I'll go back to hand slip stitching my hems. At least I won't be enraged while I do it, and I probably won't threaten to burst into flames.0/5 if I could.