Hi all, I have a mid 50s Martin style 0 I dearly love... fantastic tone, no cracks and in great shape. My dilemma is this: I lead a big uke jam and perform pretty regularly and would love the ease of tuning that I could get with Gotoh UPT tuners. Sure I could put them on another newer uke but the Martin is... well, awesome sounding.
What do you folks think? I'm not planning to sell it anytime soon, and it's a style 0 so not exactly rare. Would the UPTs kill its resale value or make it a more attractive uke as a "player"? If you saw it for sale would you run the other way because it had been modified or think "Cool! A vintage Martin that's easy to tune!"
It's a one-way conversion because the holes will need to be enlarged slightly to accommodate the UPTs, so I really want to be sure before taking a reamer to it.
Here it is in action in its present state:
What do you folks think? I'm not planning to sell it anytime soon, and it's a style 0 so not exactly rare. Would the UPTs kill its resale value or make it a more attractive uke as a "player"? If you saw it for sale would you run the other way because it had been modified or think "Cool! A vintage Martin that's easy to tune!"
It's a one-way conversion because the holes will need to be enlarged slightly to accommodate the UPTs, so I really want to be sure before taking a reamer to it.
Here it is in action in its present state: