Mine is an Elna SU, bought in Australia in 1973. It was a "top of the range" machine that cost me 4 weeks wages. Swiss built, strong and reliable. Only been to the repairers twice in 45 years. I oil and clean it regularly. When I was back in the UK, mum saw it and was jealous, so I bought one for her out of the paper for £25 in full working order. Then I saw another for £25, and then bought a fourth, complete with lovely sewing cabinet for £65 from ebay. I often have several project on the go, so may have three machines threaded up and ready to go. One black, one white, one coloured. I've been to various sewing classes when people had bought fancy new machines and just couldn't manage them. I've been to other classes which provided machines. They were almost brand new and worked well, but I just didn't like the plasticky noise they made, and it was so much more difficult to see the needle to thread it easily. That's a real consideration as you get older! Also consider where it is going to live. A heavy machine is fine if it's going to live on a desk permanently, not so good if you need to move it off the dining table every time you have a meal. There are abandoned sewing machines in cupboards across the country, so you could even put a wanted ad in your local paper and see what turns up, or ask friends and family if they have one they don't use. I now have mum's SU and until recently my grandmother's hand Singer. That's now gone to Africa to help someone else. My SU machines have all sorts of stitches available, but in all honesty I just use straight, buttonhole, or three step zig zag (known as the wiggly wiggly stitch in my family!). There are no prizes for having the most expensive machine a salesman can persuade you to buy
