How to Turn an Old Sewing Machine Into Book Ends With a Twist

During the pandemic my Husband taught himself how to restore old vintage sewing machines. He has continued to this day, even fixing and donating machines that no one wants to third world countries that really need and appreciate them.

Sadly, some are beyond repair. As a matter of fact, Hubs had already stripped the usable parts on this one to save to repair other sewing machines. He was just about to scrap the rest to recycle the metal. But not on my watch! I couldn’t wait to resurrect this vintage sewing machine into bookends!

However, the repurposing didn't stop there! As we were cleaning out my Dad's stuff to sell the house, I happened on a set of 'The Book of Knowledge' encyclopedias. It got me thinking: "how cool would it be to make bookends out of actual books"? That's where the twist comes in.

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For this project you’ll need:

• Impact driver (for loosening screws/bolts)
• A hacksaw and extra replacement blades
• Penetrating oil (for the bolts and hacksaw blade)
• Painter’s tape
• Heavy duty clamp
• Dremel with a grinding wheel
• Black and silver Sharpies
• Plastic and paper (to catch metal shavings)
• Utility or X-acto knife
• Duct tape
• Scrap of wood
• Clear silicone
• Spade bit
• Wood screws
• Metal bookends (or make wood ones if you prefer)
• Autosol Metal Polish
• Sandpaper
• Scrap of fabric, foam ball and fibre fill (if you need to make a pin cushion)
• Alien tape (optional)
• Aleene’s Tacky Glue
• Books (search thrift stores for 4 books of consistent size and thickness)
• Scroll saw or jig saw

I do feel bad that this sewing machine couldn't be repaired. What I love most about this machine is that it's smaller than other models (a 3/4 bed) making it a great size for a bookshelf. However, that smaller bed posed a challenge that we'll get to further ahead – but we made it work!

The first picture shows a similar machine with all the doo-dads still attached. When you disassemble the machine before cutting it, be sure to note where everything goes back. Record a video or take pictures. Also, be sure to put all the parts into separate bags and mark them. Of course, I have an ace up my sleeve because Hubs knows these machines pretty well :).

Tape around the part you want to cut. I chose to cut just beyond all the wording. But by leaving all the wording fully legible after cutting, we ran into a glitch (more about that later). These designs are often really pretty and sometimes even hand painted! We drew a straight line onto the tape with marker as our guide.

It's a good idea to loosen the three bolts holding the base on before cutting the machine. The base is not needed. However, after loosening them you'll leave them in place for the time being. That’s so it will hold everything as we cut; then we can remove the bolts after.

If you watch the video, you’ll see we practiced on another machine first to get our technique down.

Use an Impact Driver

There are two ways to remove the bolts. Some makers drill them which sends sharp metal shavings flying. But here’s our trick for removing the bolts with no mess. Instead of drilling, use an hand impact driver. An impact driver is a specialized tool (not to be confused with a screwdriver) that comes with a variety of bits for slotted and Phillips fasteners.

The hand impact driver operates using a combination of downward force and rotational torque (i.e there’s an inside gear that tries to turn it every time you hit it). It features a specialized bit holder that accepts screwdriver bits or hex bits, and a handle or grip for applying force.

In this case, the bolts can be difficult to remove on a vintage sewing machine because the whole machine is dipped in black Japanning paint, seeping into every nook and cranny and 'gluing' it together.

To use a hand impact driver, you insert the appropriate bit into the holder, align it with the stuck fastener, and apply downward pressure with a hammer while simultaneously putting pressure on the direction you want the fastener to turn. The impact driver’s design allows you to strike the end of the handle with a hammer or mallet to deliver sharp impacts that help loosen the fastener.

To start, if you prefer to work upright, securely clamp the sewing machine upside down to a table. Alternatively, you can work on a garage floor - but if you do this, remove the thread pin on top or it will likely get bent as you use the impact driver.

To judge if the bolts have loosened, before using the impact driver, use the silver Sharpie to run a line from the three bolts onto the bottom of the sewing machine right onto the base.

The 3rd pic shows how it should look. The silver marks show up against the black and will allow you to see when the bolt moves and is ready to unscrew. Now take a hammer and impact driver and smack it to break the bond of the paint.

See in the second last picture how the silver Sharpie marking no longer lines up? The bolts can now be easily unscrewed later, as you see on the video!

The shaft running horizontally through the arm of the machine is what holds the hand wheel and needle assembly onto the machine. It needs to be removed to saw through the cast iron body.

However, we had a difficult time figuring out how to remove it. At first we tried vice grips but only managed to remove one screw.

So we gave up on the shaft and decided to cut through it like we saw another blogger do on video. It looked easy enough so how hard could it be? Turns out, it’s very difficult to cut through. And because it’s hardened steel, it will dull a number of blades and slow down the process immensely.

After 10 minutes of making no progress with the hacksaw, you can see that Hubs barely even nicked the shaft. So it it was back to the drawing board to figure out how to remove it!

Every sewing machine is a little different and we finally figured it out. If you want make these bookends, you'll understand much better than I can explain it if you watch the video starting at the 5:31 timestamp to see how to remove the arm shaft on this 99 model! It will save you tons of time, aggravation and wear and tear on the hacksaw too.

Before starting to cut, protect the table surface with paper and oil the hacksaw blade if you wish (we didn't do this step, but oiling can help with a smoother by helping combat the friction). We also wrapped the base in plastic to protect it (in case I come up with another use for it).

Cut along the line on the tape straight up and down. Veering off your line may leave a noticeable gap against the bookend so be patient and keep vertical as you saw.

Those metal shavings are fine, so be sure to wear eye protection in case the wind picks up while you’re working outside. It wouldn’t be fun to get that in your eyes.

If the hacksaw dulls as you are cutting, put in a fresh blade. But unless you try to cut through the shaft, one blade should suffice.

Wrap up the paper with the metal shavings and clean the table top first before removing the sewing machine bed. Alternatively, work on the garage floor.

Since you already loosened the bolts, go ahead and finish unscrewing them. Once you’re ready to remove the base, add a piece of wood before giving it a few taps with a hammer (remember it’s also sealed with the factory finish).

A few taps and it’s free! I’ll think up a way to use the base for something else!

Check the cut edges of the two pieces to see if there are any bumps that need to be flattened!

No matter how careful you are with cutting, you may be left with a metal burr (in the first picture you'll see we have a bump at the end of the cut where the two pieces separated). It will need to be smooth to sit flush again the book ends.

Use a dremel with an abrasive attachment to grind it smooth. Again wear eye protection and we’re also covering the surface areas for easy cleanup of the metal shavings.

Now polish the silver metal pieces if desired. Our favourite metal polish for sewing machines is Autosol Metal Polish.

The decorative metal may seem clean enough, but look how much black tarnish comes off the cover plate after polishing (last pic)!

To put all the pieces back onto the sewing machine so it looks like it still works, you will need to cut the shaft into two pieces.

We used a dremel with a cutting wheel to cut each side of the shaft. Take all safety precautions and wear suitable eye protection etc when you do this. When deciding where to cut the shaft, keep it shorter than each section of the sewing machine (i.e. subtract more than the width of the wood plug you’ll make in the next section). If you happen to cut the shaft just a bit too long, as long as it doesn’t extend longer than the cut, you can use a spade bit to drill out a divot in the wood plug.

The cut piece in the first pic goes on the needle side of the machine.

And the one in the 2nd pic goes on the opposite side with the hand wheel.

Put each respective shaft piece back through the centre of the cut sewing machine sections. They each get re-fastened with a set screw.

Now, you can start to put the rest of the metal pieces back onto the sewing machine body.

The hand wheel side is pretty easy to assemble. If you want to see how to reinstall the parts for the needle bar, watch the video!

Create a pair of wood plugs so you can securely attach the two halves into the bookends with screws.

First, make a template by placing painters or duct tape over the two areas that were cut. Use an X-Acto knife to cut away the inside, leaving a template of the inside dimension of the two hollows for each piece of the sewing machine.

Stick the template to scrap wood (about 5/8" thick) and cut out with a scroll saw or jig saw.

Sand as necessary to ensure a good fit. Once you’re happy with the fit, add clear silicone to permanently hold the wood plugs in place. Wipe away any silicone from the edge that will rest up against the bookends and let dry according to package directions. 

Now, let’s make the book ends. If you prefer to make wooden book ends you can. However, we're creating the book ends out of real books, which is what makes this project so different (just like we made this quirky and unique upcycled book shelf ).

This set of The Book of Knowledge was a children's encyclopedia given to my Dad when he was 10 years old! I saved them from getting tossed out when my sisters and I were clearing out the house.

The trick is to making this work is to hide the metal book ends inside the books for support! We made the ones you see above by bending sheet metal 90 degrees. If you buy metal book ends, try to get ones that are perfectly smooth so they don't interfere with the closing of the books.

Embellish the books if you wish or leave as is. Open the front cover of the vertical book and wrap it around the metal. For the horizontal book, wrap the back cover around the metal and slide it against the upright book. You can add double faced tape along the insides of the covers to help hold in place if necessary, but we didn't need it.

When we put the right half of the sewing machine on top of the book, we noticed our mistake right away. There’s a big gap between the book and the sewing machine because of the way the base flares out at the bottom – and also because it’s a shorter 3/4 bed machine. You wouldn’t have this problem with a longer bed machine - or if we had moved the cut over to the left. Since we do prefer the smaller size, and it's what we have to work with, we’ll show you what we did to fix it!

We were inspired by many of the old machines where you find fabric around the arm. It provides a place to put pins as you remove them to sew. That results in what’s called pin rash on the arm – lots of scratches from years of sticking pins in the fabric. So our solution is to create a ‘pin cushion’ to fill the gap using a styrofoam ball.

Measure the gap. Use a hacksaw and utility knife to cut and shape the foam ball to the same width. Then wrap with fibre fill.

Cut a strip of fabric wide enough to cover the styrofoam with some excess. Then use the longest stitch on your sewing machine to sew along both sides. Gather it as necessary and wrap the foam ball, cutting and folding in the raw edge where it overlaps. Now glue the fabric to the foam. We love Aleene’s Tacky Glue for this step.

Pin as you glue and let it dry. Note to self: next time insert the pins a little further beyond where you glue so the pins don’t become permanently glued in place! Needle nose pliers will help remove the pins if they do become stuck!

Glue the pincushion to the wood plug. Position the right half of the sewing arm on the base of the book lining up the pincushion vertically too. Pre-drill from inner side of the metal bookend through the book, pincushion and into the wood plug to secure. Then screw in place.

Stick some pins in to match the books!

On the other side, centre and position the plates onto the books. If you want them to sit flush, as they would on a real sewing machine bed, trace the outline and cut out the cover with a utility or X-acto knife.

Measure down to see where the right arm meets the top of the book. Then add a piece of painter’s tape on the left side so you know where it should line up.

Before you screw anything in place, if you want to be sure of your placement, use some Alien Tape.

Now eyeball the placement in relation to the other half. Once you're happy with it, remove the Alien Tape (it will gum up the drill bit), and predrill through the metal, front cover and into the wood. Two screws should do it to permanently fix in place.

Place your books in between the two halves of your bookends and finito! You’ve got yourself an awesome pair of sewing machine bookends made with real books! That ‘pincushion’ really saved the day.

The Book of Knowledge set is really perfect for this project because red is the main colour of the Singer sewing brand and they are thick and sturdy. These books were published in 1945 so they are 78 years old; the exact age that my father was when he passed away!

By the way, with Father’s Day coming up, I just wrote about this homemade gift for dad in honour of all dads everywhere :). If you need a unique idea for Father’s Day, check it out!

It’s not always easy to upcycle something that has sentimental value, so we would suggest scanning thrift stores for hard cover books you can use guilt-free.

A 3/4 bed machine is a good size for a bookshelf. Any bigger and you won’t have much room for books, which is the whole point. However, if we ever come across another unsalvageable machine and do this project again, we’ll likely cut right through the logos and skip having to make the pin cushion; maybe a true 50/50 cut?

I would also spend more time searching for a way to remove the shaft. Every machine is a little different. However, many parts are typically held in place by hidden setscrews. So take time to find those, and you’ll save a lot of time in the long run (and wear and tear on hacksaw blades)!

Besides these DIY bookends, we have so many other cool projects you can make with sewing machine parts! For instance, check out this thread holder and this DIY earring holder. We also have tons of unique sewing table ideas you won’t find anywhere else!

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