Slotted headstock

Slotted headstock Looking for a plan with dimensions and Thickness

Check out the Kanile'a headstocks and try to copy them. The problem with other designs is that most slothead tuners are too big for ukulele which results in disproportional looking and heavy headstocks. Kanile's designed theirs around the Gotoh Stealth-Key tuners so they are thinnner than others and improve sound rather than add weight.

merlin666 said:

Check out the Kanile'a headstocks and try to copy them. The problem with other designs is that most slothead tuners are too big for ukulele which results in disproportional looking and heavy headstocks. Kanile's designed theirs around the Gotoh Stealth-Key tuners so they are thinnner than others and improve sound rather than add weight.

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I"ve never used the tuners but they are nice looking to my eye, proportional and can be used with slotted headstock. Cost? Not cheap.

Thank you for the info I’m gonna check it out now

Take heed of Chuck's comments on slot ramp angle and depth. Although it is understandable, and perhaps even acceptable that a first time builder might not get this quite right, it is easily avoidable. It is surprising how many experienced builders fail to get adequate separation between the ramp floor and the string path.
After the tuner holes are drilled, a dummy nut and a small straight edge will show you how deep they need to go. Make provision for side-to-side string winding on the tuner barrel (not just the centre) when doing your calculations.

Lots of things to watch out for making slotted headstocks. Can take some time to come up with a design where the strings don't touch the wood before they reach the tuner rollers. That's a no-no in the instrument world! Good idea to draw it out. The headstock angle ( Much more shallow than a flathead. Mine is about 6 degrees.), where the slot starts, angle of the slot, slot width, and distance of the rollers from the nut all interact. Making mock ups in some soft wood like basswood is a very good idea IMO. Fast cutting and easy on the tools. All slotted tuners, except the Gotohs require a fairly thick headstock, but I've not found the added weight to be an issue. I use Grover's and Schaller's. My uke necks are Spanish cedar, so they are light to begin with. If the rollers are too long for your design and touch in the middle on the G and A string, it's no problem to grind some length off the shaft. Good luck-Bob

I use the stealth tuners. However they are a little delicate. It's easy to wreck them and or bend the shaft part. They do make them with shorter shaft and this would make them less likely to bend if you bang them on something. If anybody knows where to get those please post.

Michael Smith said:

I use the stealth tuners. However they are a little delicate. It's easy to wreck them and or bend the shaft part. They do make them with shorter shaft and this would make them less likely to bend if you bang them on something. If anybody knows where to get those please post.

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Ken I think those Stealth tuners are for a solid headstock. You want the STP31 for slotted headstocks. I know that Japarts carries them in guitar sets of 3L + 3R but they might be able to configure a ukulele for you. Or you could buy two sets and have enough for three ukuleles. As Michael says the posts will still be long. I know that Kanile’a has ukuleles with short post slot head Stealth tuners but they probably buy quite a few directly from Gotoh.

Years ago before Gotoh made Slot head Stealths I modified a set of standard Stealth tuners to fit a slot head. I cut down the roller, and drilled a hole in it. I shortened the post as much as I could. It was more work than I really wanted to do but they were quite functional. In the end I decided that they were too small for my eye and they looked a little cheap to me. Also the 18:1 ratio is a little too much for a ukulele in my opinion.

So I started contacting tuner manufacturers like Shertler, Scheller Rodgers and others to see if they were interested in making a scaled down slot head tuner more proportional to the ukulele. So far I haven’t had any luck in that department.