What tuners are popular these days?

Matt Clara

Matt Clara

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Years back, when I frequented the site more, some people on here got excited about some tuners from Taisamlu, a Taiwanese seller of ukes and uke parts on ebay, and I bought a bunch at the time and I have only one set left, and it's gold and I don't want to put it on my current build and I was wondering what's popular now? Whatever you favor, let's hear it.
 
Personally, I'm leaning towards planetary tuners, but they all look kind of chunky, except for pegheds, which I've installed before but thought it was a pain, and they're expensive! StewMac has the graph tech for $25, but they are very homely. Gotohs are $70, and then there are Taiwanese knock offs for ~$40. Here's the ones by Taisamlu I mentioned earlier--he's still selling them. Back then you used to be able to make an offer on ebay, so he'd want $13 for them, but you'd select five of them and offer $50. That's how I ended up with something like eight of them.
 
Can't beat Gotoh in my opinion for looks and function, but the Graphtechs work perfectly well.
 
I'm not a gear head by nature and have never been into the tuner fetish thing. The ultimate fetish were the tuners that were posted on here that cost $650 dollars. Ridiculous if you ask me, but they were very nice looking. Works of art actually. I've used the cheap closed gear tuners from China and have found them to be perfectly serviceable. Hey, they wind string so what's the problem? I've never used Waverly's as I think they are over priced. Mostly I just use Grover's which do the job. I don't use planetary tuners since my ukes are tenors, but are fine on sopranos. I have no opinion on them.
 
The ones from the Taiwan seller are Der Jung, and excellent quality for the cost. I've had a set of Gotoh mandolin tuners and thought they were very poorly made. Just bought a set of Rubner tuners for a mandolin I'm currently building, they seem very good quality even though they are the most basic and cheapest ones they make. Rubner do make some nice tuners and seem to be quite popular now, so check them out.
 
Matt Clara said:
Personally, I'm leaning towards planetary tuners, but they all look kind of chunky, except for pegheds, which I've installed before but thought it was a pain, and they're expensive! StewMac has the graph tech for $25, but they are very homely. Gotohs are $70, and then there are Taiwanese knock offs for ~$40. Here's the ones by Taisamlu I mentioned earlier--he's still selling them. Back then you used to be able to make an offer on ebay, so he'd want $13 for them, but you'd select five of them and offer $50. That's how I ended up with something like eight of them.
Click to expand...

$34 CND shipping, so much for cheap rates now.
 
Grover 9NB are my default. They look nice, they're really cheap, and they're very good in terms of functionality - as good or better than many expensive tuners I've tried over the years. And it gives me a little peace of mind that they're from a recognizable brand name.
 
Matt you old dog! Have you come in from the wilderness?

Most luthiers use Der Jung. Waverly are currently experiencing serious quality issues.

I don't want to get into a spitting game. Go over to face book tomorrow and I'll do a broadcast just for you on tuners.
 
The owner's club, Pete? I'll pop in, for sure. And Mikeyb2 seems to be saying the Der Jung are to be had on Ebay, from the likes of Taisamlu? Thanks. Looks like $12 shipping to the US, so, $47 US, total. Those Grovers are open backed geared, I'm pretty sure. I've used those before, in fact, I've got one of my first builds here in my office and I just checked, and sure enough, those are open backed geared grovers. They have a nice solid feel to them, but I want to build one without the ears for a change, lol. And I don't like friction tuners. Fidgety they are. Thanks guys. I'd never heard of Der Jung before.
 
Matt Clara said:
The owner's club, Pete? I'll pop in, for sure. And Mikeyb2 seems to be saying the Der Jung are to be had on Ebay, from the likes of Taisamlu? Thanks. Looks like $12 shipping to the US, so, $47 US, total. Those Grovers are open backed geared, I'm pretty sure. I've used those before, in fact, I've got one of my first builds here in my office and I just checked, and sure enough, those are open backed geared grovers. They have a nice solid feel to them, but I want to build one without the ears for a change, lol. And I don't like friction tuners. Fidgety they are. Thanks guys. I'd never heard of Der Jung before.
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I know, going to sound like whining, $12 shipping to US, $34 to Canada. Hard to get through the snow and cold I guess.
 
Me too! Is there something in between the stock Grovers I have and the Waverlys?
 
timmit65 said:
Me too! Is there something in between the stock Grovers I have and the Waverlys?
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Gotah sells an adjustable string post height tuner that some ukulele luthiers rave about. I've never used them but I've seen them on instruments. Nice looking. Having an adjustable string post allows for different peghead depth sizes which can be a blessing sometimes, especially on ukuleles which tend to have a thinner peghead than guitars and many tuning machines are just guitar tuners sold in lots of four. Gotah does not sell to the public so you have to buy through a third party.

GOTOH UK700 UKULELE TUNING MACHINES W/ HEIGHT ADJUSTABLE POSTS. Price USD $42.

https://www.philadelphialuthiertool...le-tuning-machines-w-height-adjustable-posts/
 
And here's Pete's discussion on the topic of tuners: https://www.facebook.com/705786030/videos/10159319706201031/ Thanks again, Pete. I'm interested in the Der Jung, but I'm leaning towards all black tuners for this build, and I don't see any of the Der Jung with black tips, just black buttons, so I think it'll be Gotoh, or possibly Pegheds. Thanks everybody. Fun discussion.
 
Matt Clara said:
And here's Pete's discussion on the topic of tuners: https://www.facebook.com/705786030/videos/10159319706201031/ Thanks again, Pete. I'm interested in the Der Jung, but I'm leaning towards all black tuners for this build, and I don't see any of the Der Jung with black tips, just black buttons, so I think it'll be Gotoh, or possibly Pegheds. Thanks everybody. Fun discussion.
Click to expand...

How about this one?

https://www.magic-guitar-parts.com/...bjectPath=/Shops/es337930/Products/DJ326UB-D6

I am having trouble finding somewhere in North America to buy their tuners.
 
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