A string consistently fraying/breaking at tuner head when stringing - Ideas?

neo1022

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Hi all,

I've run into a problem I'm having a hard time figuring out. When I was restringing my new Blackbird Farallon, I noticed that the flurocarbon A string (put on by Joel at HMS during setup) was fraying at the tuner head (Gotoh planetary), at the base of the wind around the tuner head. The string was white, fattened out, and the strands were separating.

I figured it was just a bad string, so I put another one on (Oasis Warm) tuned it, and let it settle in. When I looked it the next day, I saw that the bottom wind had gone white again. When I backed it off the head a bit, I saw that it had also flattened and separated. I tried two additional fluorocarbon strings (Martin and another Oasis), all with the same results. The Worth actually snapped during tuning.

So, I'm wondering what's going on. Two different people using three different sets of strings have all produced the same results, so I know it's not stringing technique or a bad batch of strings. The peg head is smooth with no burrs or sharp edges. The nut groove seems to be smooth and wide enough. It's always the last wind around the peg that seems to fray. And I'm not overstretching the string -- it's tuned to A4.

It almost seems like the tension on that bottom wind gets a bit too high for the string to handle, and the fibers in the fluorocarbon begin to snap right on the tuner head (which gives it the deformed white separated look). The string looks fine until you slacken it and unwind it from the tuner head -- then you can see the damage.

This is not an issue on any other strings on the instrument, and it has never been a problem on any other ukes I own (including another Farallon I have). Any ideas? It's driving me crazy!!!

Thanks!
 
Any chance the damage is happening as the string passes through a nut slot that's tight or got a sharp edge, with the resulting degradation in integrity only being apparent at the tuner? I'm not betting on this being the issue, but a recent experience putting Nylguts on a banjo setup for steel showed some nasty effects due to the mismatched nut.
 
As a longtime fluorocarbon user, yes, this happens quite often (9 times out of 10). Not sure why. Wish it didn't, but I've only had one string actually break on me because of this in 10 years. Maybe it's the diameter of the peg. Smaller would put more stress on the outer edge I would think.
 
Seems like an opportunity to try some different tuning pegs. If the same thing happens, you'll know it's not the tuning peg. If it doesn't happen again...

Alternately, swap the upper and lower tuning peg.
 
How many winds around the post do you have for the A string?

If too many, and the lower winds are chafing against the NUT that fixes the UPT tuner to the headstock, this will damage the string and cause the problems you have been having.

It happened to me when I installed the UPT tuners on a headstock that was about 2mm thicker than the UPT tuners were spec'd for and I had to replace them with the UPT-L tuners (which are LONGER and designed for a front-to-back thicker headstock).

The problem was with the nut that is on the face of the headstock, at the base of the shaft, does not thread down ALL THE WAY, and as such, creates a gully where the string may mind DOWN and BELOW the surface of the nut, and as it does so, it gets chafed and will eventually break at that place of damage from string tension at concert pitch.

If you inspect your tuner and mind how you are winding your string, you can see if this is happening.

Also, with most fluoro strings, and on the Gotoh UPT/UPT-L tuners, if you pull the string thru the hole in the tuner shaft, with little to no slack, and then wind up from there, you can usually get 2-3 wraps around the tuner shaft, which is fine, but more than that, and you run the risk of chafing the string as the later winds will push down towards the headstock and be touching the nut of the tuner's shaft.

Please look and report back. Hope this helps. :)
 
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