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Post subject: Fender Locking Tuners?
Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:09 am
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I've got a Strat and a Tele with the Fender Locking tuners and I found that the posts have different heights to them and on the gear casing the have either an I, II or IIII on them. Does anyone know the correct way to install these tuners so that the stagger is correct. It seems that from looking at the posts on my guitars they are installed dofferently on each guitar. What would be the best for both?
Thanks,
tfancil


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:20 am
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Tallest two nearest the nut, shortest furthest away.


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:29 am
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Ceri wrote:
Tallest two nearest the nut, shortest furthest away.


^^ That's the most common, and recommended way to do it. For some reason, I put my sperzels on the opposite way. Why? I figured I wanted the sharpest angle on the lower strings. The higher four strings use string trees, so it didn't matter if those stems were higher, since the trees will keep them at a good angle anyway. This way they all have pretty good angles and a stronger contact point. At least, that's what I tell myself :)


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:37 am
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Hello Dgonz,

I like your logic I'm gonna give
it a try on next string change.

Cheers.


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:46 am
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dgonz wrote:
Ceri wrote:
Tallest two nearest the nut, shortest furthest away.


^^ That's the most common, and recommended way to do it. For some reason, I put my sperzels on the opposite way. Why? I figured I wanted the sharpest angle on the lower strings. The higher four strings use string trees, so it didn't matter if those stems were higher, since the trees will keep them at a good angle anyway. This way they all have pretty good angles and a stronger contact point. At least, that's what I tell myself :)


strange, but interesting.

I have locking Sperzels on one peghead, and Schallers on another, and in both cases I don't need a string-tree, which I guess must be helping the intonation. Both guitars certainly are very stable, pitchwise

Just to check whether it was all expensive voodoo I took the string-tree off another guitar with ordinary tuners for a little while, and yes, the top strings did occasionally jump out of the nut slot. Only with pretty aggressive playing, mind you.

So I guess either the tree or the staggered poles makes just that crucial difference. About one or two degrees of arc, to my eye.


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:48 am
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Just keep in mind that "my" way is doing it backwards. But, to me, that made the most sense for the string angle, tone and sustain.


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 10:58 am
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From above:
Ceri wrote:
I have locking Sperzels on one peghead, and Schallers on another, and in both cases I don't need a string-tree, which I guess must be helping the intonation.


Uh - and when I said Schallers I was getting mixed up with the staggered poles on the Fender branded tuners on my American Series. Getting my lockers mixed up with my staggerers.

Wake up, Ceri :oops:


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 1:27 pm
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Ceri wrote:
Tallest two nearest the nut, shortest furthest away.


Thanks, that is what I was thinking but it looks like my Jim Root Tele has them factory installed backwards with the taller post on the lighter gauge strings. I already installed a brushed set on my Hardtail just like you suggested and that's what got me wondering.
Thanks for the reply,
tfancil


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Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 2:25 pm
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I'm guessing that since many (most) guitars other than Fender have headstock angled away from the nut, that the staggered tuner shaft heights would mean that the tuner-to-nut angle would be consistent across all strings.

Since Fender headstocks are flat and don't angle, and mine already had two string trees that I don't care to remove, I just put my in "backwards" so the shortest shafts are used on the two (low) strings that don't have trees already.


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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 6:39 am
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dgonz wrote:
I'm guessing that since many (most) guitars other than Fender have headstock angled away from the nut, that the staggered tuner shaft heights would mean that the tuner-to-nut angle would be consistent across all strings.


Ah, but there you touch upon a characteristic of Leo Fender's company that always fascinated me. On the one hand, Mr Fender has been one of the most innovative people in the history of musical instruments. He brought out the Telecaster, listened to players' comments and then incorporated them into the Stratocaster, which was such an excellent piece of design we play it 54 years later almost unchanged. Also, the fretted Precision bass, the Jazz bass, the Jazzmaster – not to mention amplifiers.

Yet a strange thing: once he’d brought a guitar design to production he seemed curiously reluctant to adjust it further. It took about a decade to put rosewood fingerboards on Teles and Strats. And he’d sold the company before they got round to putting 5-way selector switches into Stratocasters.

So. The one thing that quietly bugs me about Fenders is the string-tree. Frankly, it’s a bit of a compromise solution to an avoidable problem. As we know, the layout of Fender necks comes from working within the dimensions of standard cuts of wood available when things were a little restricted in the immediate post-war years. A flat headstock could be got out of a piece of timber just an inch thick, but this necessitated the string-tree to keep the top strings in their slots.

Yet the minute sales took off the company could start sourcing materials produced to their own requirements, and it would have been easy to ask for neck blanks an inch and a quarter thick, which would give enough wood to make a gently back-sloping peghead. As seen [above] just a couple of degrees makes all the difference and obviates the need for a string-tree. Ibanez do it without a second thought, and in fact a much less steep angle than theirs works fine. One can only conclude that once an instrument was going down the production line Leo just didn’t want to mess with it any further.

And this peculiar conservatism remains to this day. Modern US Strats frequently come with staggered tuner poles – and yet they still put a string-tree on there anyway. Just because they always have. Weird, but interesting.


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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:34 am
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I agree. That philosophy is good and bad. Good because you don't want to mess too much with something that "works", and being too flaky and changing things all the time isn't a good thing.

But it's bad if you'd never consider updating or "fixing" issues with the original design, without actually having to change the basic principle of it.


... and on another note: I believe both Sperzel and Schaller both come with staggered height shafts OR same height shafts. Most stores just happen to carry the staggered ones.


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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:41 am
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dgonz wrote:
... and on another note: I believe both Sperzel and Schaller both come with staggered height shafts OR same height shafts. Most stores just happen to carry the staggered ones.


Ah-ha. Useful info. Contrary to what I wrote first, my locking Schaller's have regular posts, not staggered. But I find the knurled locking wheel on the back friendlier to the fingers than the one on the Sperzels. And I believe the locking Sperzels are only available in a brushed finish, not shiny...?

So, if Schallers are available with staggered poles too, then I'll be looking out for those next time around. Thanks.


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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 8:20 am
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Yes, the Schallers I have are nicer to use that the smaller wheels of my Sperzels that dig into your fingers very nicely.

Sperzels are available in number of finishes, in chrome, matte silver, black, gold, and matte gold. If you are really into colors, they offer blue purple, red, green, etc - or at least, they used to.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/ ... D=26023905

I have the chrome staggered ones. I didn't pay attention when I bought them. If I had, I probably would have gotten the flat ones instead of the staggered, but it doesn't really bother me.


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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 8:26 am
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Interesting. I've only seen brushed chrome, gold or black Sperzels, not shiny.

But purple?!!

Man, I'd refinish a whole guitar just to match a set of those! (No I wouldn't...)

'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky.


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Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2008 10:38 am
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They make staggered and non-staggered.


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