The good news this morning – the cabinet had arrived at Sew from the Heart. The not so good news – both Noel and Keith (SftH’s amazing tech team) are on vacation so it couldn’t be delivered until next week when they are back. Now that was a problem! And every problem has a solution, right? I can drive a van, and I’m pretty strong. So all I needed was someone else with some muscle and the willingness to put it to good use. And into the store walked John – an 830 owner with muscle and the willingness to help!

This thing comes in a REALLY big box! Weighing in at 180 lbs, it’s not an easy task to move it around.

Anyone paying attention would have noticed that one side of the box had written on it in pretty big letters: “Open Here”. It took us a while to figure this out – having already opened the box on the other side and removed all of the packaging materials, of which there was a lot!

Finally it’s out, and all the packaging has been removed. 60″ wide and 19.5″ deep at it’s smallest.

With the back flap up, it extends to 39″ deep.

With the front flap up as well, there is an extra 16″ of depth – just where you need it most for quilting the larger quilts. This is a neat design – open the draw and an extension table fits right on top.

If you’re going to do embroidery, the machine sits right on the top, with the airlift table in the top position.

Push down on the machine, and the table lowers to position number 2. Now everything is level for regular sewing and quilting. A cutout (that bit is still to come) fills in the gap around the machine so that a continuous surface is created. Changing the bobbin is going to be interesting – I’ll have to see how visibility is when my cutout arrives.

Push down again and the airlift table goes all the way to the bottom. The machine is now nicely stored – with a full sized insert to fill the hole.

Now I’m really ready for some serious sewing and embroidery!

The sewing machine box is about 30″ wide, 17″ deep and 24″ tall. No small task moving this baby around! First out is the removable table, then some manuals and other bits and pieces, and finally the machine itself is revealed.

I was going to put it on the portable cutting table, but common sense prevailed. The cutting mat was moved over to the portable cutting table so that the Bernina 830 could have pride of place – and a good deal of stability – on the main cutting table.

Accessories

The Bernina 830 comes with 5 (beautifully big) bobbins – one of which is already in the machine; 10 feet, all of which have an optical eye, 2 of which work with the dual feed system; and a whole bunch of other things!

The white cone has a really good purpose – I just can’t remember what it is right now! From the left, the mirror for use when threading the bobbin for embroidery; a pair of tweezers; needle housing “screw driver”; stylus for the beautiful big screen; multi-purpose tool; cleaning brush; seam ripper; and some oil!

Bernina 8 series jumbo bobbins are much bigger than the bobbins for the other Bernina machines. They hold 40% more thread – so you can do a lot more stitching!

Every sewing machine needs a slide-on table, and the Bernina 830 really delivers! Nothing can beat a set-in cabinet for the ultimate sewing experience, but this slide-on table offers and excellent workspace – as well as support for the hoop when doing embroidery.

There’s a pretty sophisticated dust cover included with the Bernina 830, with a hole for the handle to show through and a number of pockets. So far I haven’t figured out what might go in these pockets, but they are there if you need them!

Embroidery Module

The embroidery module comes in a separate box. Taking the lid off reveals a tray containing 3 embroidery hoops (small, medium and large oval hoops), a USB cable, the #26 foot for embroidery, hoop clips, a box of literature and a CD.

Finally out of the box, and the embroidery module is ready to be attached to the sewing machine. It’s a pretty easy connection – lift up the left hand side of the embroidery module and tuck the two extensions on the right hand side into the sewing machine. A good solid surface is required to hold the machine to make sure that all contacts are made.

The sliding table is designed to be used with the embroidery module. It slides underneath the embroidery arm – and when installed it provides support for the hoop, especially the jumbo hoop.

This machine is now ready for action!!!

The biggest issue now is what to do with the boxes! Maybe it would make a good coffee table… watch this space for more news on that!