I need tuners

102263

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 1, 2010
Messages
60
Reaction score
0
Location
A-Town PA
UPDATE: Thanks for the recommendation WhenDogsSing. I've bought and received the Grover geared tuners, and I'm eager to put them on my uke. I'm just wondering what the purpose of the bushings are? Do they serve an important purpose, or could I just drill holes the size of the peg itself and forget about the bushing? All I'm working with is a power hand drill and I would like to get this project done by tommorow-ish, so if I only had to drill one sized hole, that'd be great. Let me know if that's possible, thanks.

I'm trying to build a ukulele based off of this guy's design:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSOpltXnJPQ

I'm at the point where I'm starting to look for tuners. I don't want to spend much more than $10 or $15 on them, but I also don't want them to be of such bad quality that they can't hold the ukulele's tune for more than a minute or two. Anyway, I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations as to what brand of tuners I could buy and where I could buy them. And what do you think about these tuners that are only $1:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/SET-OF-4-UK...724?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item5890a8f824

Any help is appreciated, thanks!
 
Last edited:
check my first post for an updated question about bushings. thanks!
 
The bushings are intended to provide an aligned machined fit for the tuner shafts. The tuner shafts are sized a few thousandths of an inch smaller than the bushings. The outer surfaces of the bushings are splined so that they can be press fit into the headstock.

You should use the bushings assuming you have a large enough reamer or drill bit to install them so that they can be press fit into the headstock.

Having said the above, you don't absolutely have to use the bushings. You can get by by just making your holes just large enough for the tuner shafts. I don't particularly like to do or see this but the tuners will still be functional without the bushings installed. You'll have a much better functioning and looking set of tuners with the bushings installed.

I have a big concern about drilling the tuner holes with a hand drill. If you drill the holes with a hand drill, you'll want to start out small and work your way up. Don't try to drill the tuner holes with one large drill bit as you could very easily screw up your ukulele. The torques developed when drilling can be pretty large. By all means, clamp the headstock down well in a vise when you do the drilling by hand drill.

I use a small drill bit followed by a hand reamer when installing tuners.
 
Top Bottom