Fitting Waverly friction pegs to a Flea?

BigJackBrass

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My Magic Fluke Company Flea is a smashing little uke, but the standard friction pegs are rather mediocre. I have a set of Waverly tuners that I was planning to put on a Mele concert, but they look to be the perfect size to fit the Flea headstock.

Has anyone tried installing this type on a Magic Fluke instrument? The double countersink they require looks potentially tricky, given the way the Flea headstock is arranged. Advice and suggestions appreciated.
 
Personally, I would not remove any more wood than absolutely necessary from a Fluke or Flea headstock.

The string tension is pulling the tuners against the front and back of the headstock, that with the stock Grover 2B friction tuners has about 6.5mm of wood on each side of the hole, and if you narrow this too much, you are likely to have issues (maybe only on tenor scale) with higher tension strings causing the wood to snap.

I've installed Grover 9NB machine heads that can use the same factory hole as the original friction tuners, as well as have installed the Gotoh UPT-L tuners, on several of my Fluke and Flea ukes. the Gotoh UPT-L tuners require the existing 6.5mm tuner hole to bored slightly larger with a reamer or unibit to about 10mm, and even so, only about half-way into the headstock

All of which is detailed in the Fluke and Flea mega-thread which you can get to from clicking the first link in my signature below. Also within that thread are links to the threads where I have installed these other tuners on Fluke and Flea ukes, with photos, of course.

As far as the countersink from the INSIDE of the headstock (the site of the string post), not sure how you would do that, and with the 'friction' part of the tuner with the button turning against the wood itself, it seems like it will both wear down the wood enough and possibly apply enough force in the tightening of the tuner to cause the thinner opposing sides (front/back) of the headstock wood to just split from the force or pressure of having the tuner tightened down.

I may be too paranoid about breakage here, but we all have our own tolerance for risk.

If it were me, the Waverly tuners are like $50 on StewMac, and the Goto UPT-L tuners are like $60-70 from HMS, I'd get the Gotoh instead, which are planetary geared tuners with a 4:1 ratio, a lot like banjo tuners, and very light weight.
 
If you really want to upgrade the tuners, Pegheds really look and work perfectly on Flukes and Fleas. (Which is why they’re available as an option from MFC.)


Scooter
 
I put pegheds on mu Walnut Fluke tenor a month after getting it. I didn't like friction at all Pegheds worked great. I would not be without. I'd like to try UPT cause I hear they are great but don't like look of them hanging over the MFC peg head.
 
Many thanks for the replies. Weakening the headstock and working out how to do the second countersink were certainly my main concerns and I agree it's probably not worth the risk. I'll put the Waverly pegs on the uke I originally bought them for and maybe change the tuners on the Flea at a later date.
 
I put a set of Waverly friction tuners on one of my Flukes without any modifications to the head stock, ignorance is bliss, and they work fine. Much better the original tuners.
 
I put a set of Waverly friction tuners on one of my Flukes without any modifications to the head stock, ignorance is bliss, and they work fine. Much better the original tuners.

Would you be so kind as to share a close-up photo or two? (at lease one from the tuner-button-side, and one from the front of the headstock?)

This is a rare occurrence it seems, and I'm sure that folks would benefit from seeing what it looks like. :)
 
As you can see, on the treble side I have turned the washer to what I believe is the correct orientation and they seem to fit better and still are much easier to tune than the originals. Look better too. image.jpg
 
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Thanks for posting those. Interesting... A slight countersink on the outer edge of the headstock might be all that's needed, judging by that.
 
As you can see, on the treble side I have turned the washer to what I believe is the correct orientation and they seem to fit better and still are much easier to tune than the originals. Look better too. View attachment 103235

These pics look better than I was expecting. Nice!
 
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