Brother Sewing and Embroidery Bobbins 10-Pack, SA156,Clear

I paid a lot of money for my Brother machines so it’s worth it to have good tension with the right bobbin! I tried the others and sent them back.

There is no reason that these cost more than others on Amazon. Take the time to find the best buy...everything is made in China anyway so go with the cheaper non-branded bobbins. I could not tell the difference so I returned these. Not a good value.

After buying a 10-pack of cheap knockoff SA156 bobbins, which did not work well at all, I spent a few extra dollars to get the real thing and Ill always do so from now on. The difference in quality between the two is laughable - these are the real deal, smooth, perfectly sized, no sharp nubs of plastic in the middle of the stems like the knockoffs (also purchased here at Amazon) had, no sharp edges to scratch your bobbin case. I highly recommend saving yourself some time and frustration and picking up these actual Brother bobbins if you have a machine that uses SA156 (and no, I dont work for Brother, just love my machine!). They might be cheaper elsewhere, I havent checked my local stores yet, but even if not Id rather pay a few extra dollars and get some quality bobbins that wont wreck my machine or cause me to waste time endlessly winding and rewinding.

Just what I wanted

Good quality and price

Brothers sewing machines require bobbins of the same brand. If you try to use other brands, you will not be able to use them. This is not a major issue, but it would be nice to use any other brand - that is why I give it only 4 stars... They perform well and seem to be of good quality. I ordered more.

I live in Hawaii and have limited fabric stores. I bought bobbins at a fabric store on the mainland that said they would work on my Brother sewing machine but they did not. So I ordered on Amazon. These work great.

Ive tried generic class 15 bobbins from a local store on my Brother CS6000i, but they had two problems: 1. The notch was a little large, so they did not lock solidly on to the winding mechanism. When winding a bobbin and it starts to get full, the thread tension can change, causing the generic bobbin to slip on the shaft. The result looks a lot like the dont use bobbins wound like this from your sewing machine manual. The genuine Brother bobbins lock solidly, dont slip, and wind properly. 2. The bobbin was slightly loose in the bobbin case (the part of the machine where the bobbin is while sewing.) This was a much bigger problem, because it caused the thread to jump out of the tensioning spring after a few stitches. The machine would still sew, but not well since the tension was out of balance. With the genuine Brother bobbins, the thread stays on the correct path, and the machine works the way its supposed to.

These are the bobbins recommended for my new Brother XR1355 sewing machine and theyve worked perfectly in it. Brother also sells these same bobbins with clips to keep the loose thread ends contained but you cant just buy the clips by themselves — thats unfortunate. Poking around on the Internet though, I saw a suggestion to take clear plastic tubing with an inside diameter of ½ and slice it into rings thin enough to fit between the sides of the bobbin. Make a single slice through one side of a ring and wrap that now curved strip of plastic around the thread on the bobbin — works great! (and its cheap!) I need cheap to compensate for the nametag premium these carry. These are genuine Brother SA156 bobbins and you pay a premium for that genuine adjective. I have purchased other, less expensive bobbins that are supposedly just like these Brother bobbins but have not had very good luck with the knock-offs. Some of them have produced tension problems or skipped stitches but others seem to work OK. Its a real crap shoot. Im tight with a buck but its not saving anything to buy something less expensive if it doesnt work properly. Comparing these to some of the substitutes Ive noticed a few things. 1. These tend to feel and look higher quality than the knock-offs. The plastic has a slight bluish tint to it but it is clear and generally flawless — the mold marks are not very obvious. The substitutes are usually colorless, feel thinner, and often have noticeable molding flaws. 2. The genuine article has a number on the center cylinder or hub when looked at from the side — possibly identifying the date or location where it was made — theres no obvious reason for it to be there. The knock-offs may have numbers in other places but I did not see any on the hub on any of the ones I purchased. 3. Looking down through the hole in the center of the bobbin, there is a notch on one side of the opening — both top and bottom. The notches line up — theyre located in the same vertical line through the bobbin. The knock-offs have the notches located on opposite sides of the center hole. If one is on the lefthand side looking down at the top, if you feel underneath the other will be on the righthand side — with the genuine bobbins theyd both be on the same side of the opening. 4. At first glance, the bobbins appear to have 4 holes to push the first bit of thread through when winding the bobbin — two on the top and two on the bottom. Closer inspection of the genuine bobbins show that each side has only one hole, not two. The second mark looks very much like a hole but it does not penetrate the side of the bobbin. The holes, like the notches, are located directly above and below each other. The knock-offs often actually have two holes on each side — one larger than the other. The larger holes come close to the size in the genuine bobbin but, like the notches on the knock-offs, are located diagonally on each side. Someone in China apparently decided providing a similar appearance was good enough — function wasnt important. I hate paying a premium price for something as inexpensive to produce as plastic bobbins but that seems to be the only way to guarantee theyll perform properly. Ive just run across another website called SewingPartsOnline dot Com which guarantees that their generic equivalents of genuine parts will perform as well. Im going to try ordering some of their SA156-equivalent bobbins and will try to remember to come back here and update this review with the results.

You can never own too many bobbins. Love just pulling out another one every time I change the color of my thread