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I would suggest buying a servo motor from someone who sells and services industrial sewing machines.

As for where to buy, I purchased the FESM-5550S servo-motors from Gregg at keysew.com, a frequent contributor to this forum.

I have read about possibly changing the pulley to a smaller one.. has anyone had any success with this?

I was as you were new to industrial sewing machines when I purchased a Singer 111W155 with a clutch motor. Professional sewers apparently get along quite well with a clutch-motor. Being a novice, then and now, I was and am unable to control the speed with a clutch motor. Not only were projects more difficult than necessary, I feared for my fingers.

I tried a smaller pulley, and it helped, but not enough.

I now have servo-motors on both of my industrial machines.

As has been said, changing from a clutch-motor to a servo-motor is easy and will likely require a different size belt.

I've had experience with two motors of each of two brands, Consew servo-motors that were not variable speed and that I do not recommend and Family FESM-550S variable speed servo-motors that I do highly recommend.

Both brands allow setting the top speed. Setting the Consew was tedious and a hassle with flashing numbers. Setting the FESM-5550S is via a dial. With the FESM-550S I can single-cycle the needle. With the Consew, I cannot reliably single-cycle the needle.

Tim, you might want to post your question on the leather sewing machines forum. There seem to more mechanical discussions there. No problem your question is not about sewing leather.

http://leatherworker.net/forum/

Try the following in google to get an idea:

singer 111w153 site:leatherworker.net

I'm just DIY, and professionals on the Web site probably have better diagnosis. This might not be a problem with just your machine. I had a Singer 111W155 and even with my current machine, climbing over seams can be a problem. You might want to try a jean-a-ma-jig (aka: hump jumper or presser foot spacer that comes in various thicknesses). I have used them to climb-over and climb-off seams.

You can find a jean-a-ma-jig on Amazon or at JoAnn.

Depending on the machine, there might be alternative. On my Juki, it is possible to adjust the ability to climb over a seam, but I'm after a quick search, I haven't found the details. I think I recall that there is also a disadvantage, but I don't recall what that was. If you are interested, I could try further.

For a temporary setup as suggested by SteveA, you might want to try tables with folding legs. I have four 24" x 48" folding-leg tables from Costco that are just about the right height, and that I can array behind and/or in front of the sewing machine for large projects, and anywhere as work tables such as for cutting. When not in use, the tables are folded and stored between a wall and the sewing machine stand. I don't recall the price, but were quite inexpensive.

The table tops are slippery, and large fabric projects slide easily. For vinyl material, I put single sheets of newsprint under the material so the vinyl slides easily. I sew right through the newsprint and later tear it off along the perforations.

We switched over from Windows to Apple about five years ago and am pleased. We now run three -- two iMacs and and a MacBook Air. While I was still working for a company that used Windows, I did most of the Office work an the iMac and transferred the work to the Windows machine for distribution.

Apple seems to be inherently more reliable. Apple controls the system hardware and provides the system software, especially the hardware drivers. A comparable Windows machine, even tha same model, typically has drivers from various manufacturers. The only OEM system hardware on our Apple machines is main memory on the iMacs. We also use Apple WIFI which is well supported.

Apple support has also been good. Whenever I've made a trouble call, which hasn't happened often, I've reached someone within minutes.

A reason to stick with Windows , or run a Windows Virtual Machine or Bootcamp, would be must have applications that run only on Windows. I do run MS Office on OS X because I had some complicated spreadsheets and I was quite familiar with Office.

Safari runs almost all web Sites. I've have had very occasional problems, and either Chrome of Firefox ran those Web sites.

The only annoyance so far has been iCloud, but which is an option.

Here are a few links on pucker mitigation.

http://www.amefird.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Minimizing-Seam-Puckering-2-5-10.pdf

http://www.coatsindustrial.com/en/information-hub/apparel-expertise/seam-puckering

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCMQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amann.com%2Ffileadmin%2Fdownload%2Fnaehfaden%2Fb_nahtkraeuseln_EN.pdf&ei=CCgpVcvxNcPSsAXWsYCgDA&usg=AFQjCNGe3qnyYZVuNHJiKuOf6ndJPMtJSA&bvm=bv.90491159,d.b2w

When I first started sewing with a top-load bobbin, rather than hold the threads, I stuck a quarter down toward the back of the machine with butyl tape and wrapped both treads one-half turn under the quarter.

A bit late, and it might not have helped, but here is a link to the Juki 1541 Engineer's Manual.

http://danreetz.com/juki/JUKI_DNU-1541-S-7EM01_SERVICE_MANUAL.pdf

 Here are two links on seam puckering that might help.

http://www.amefird.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Minimizing-Seam-Puckering-2-5-10.pdf

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=7&cad=rja&uact=8&sqi=2&ved=0CDMQFjAG&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amann.com%2Ffileadmin%2Fdownload%2Fnaehfaden%2Fb_nahtkraeuseln_EN.pdf&ei=apW2VLmCKYSRyQTVlYDwAQ&usg=AFQjCNGe3qnyYZVuNHJiKuOf6ndJPMtJSA&bvm=bv.83640239,d.aWw

I'm curious if anyone has an opinion about the following DVD.

http://www.canvastraining.com/sunshop/index.php?l=product_detail&p=452

No help on the pullers, but a Theraband FlexBar has helped me greatly with tennis elbow.

http://thera-band.com/store/products.php?ProductID=20

I have all four resistances. I started with yellow and could almost not stand the pain. I'm up to the blue with almost no pain. I bought a complete set from amazon.

The exercise with the FlexBar for tennis elbow is called the Tyler Twist.

I've never made one, but I've read a few. Try "how to make a business plan" or "how to write a business plan" in google or amazon and you'll get several possibilties.

Actually, you might want to write two or three business plans for the same opportunity -- I've seen variations of all three -- such as:

Business plan for investors.
Business plan for bank or grantor.
Business plan for self (what you actually think you might achieve).

I do not have experience. However, the following Sailrite link covers the leach line as part of replacing sacrificial cover on a jib.

http://www.sailrite.com/Installing-Sacrificial-Cover-Made-With-Sunbrella-Video