Banjo tuners?

[Tony Turley]

Hello everyone. I have a baritone uke I built last year, a Kasha from Hana Lima 'IA plans. I wanted the headstock to look more vintage, so I used long post Grover friction tuners, model 6B, I think. I like the looks and sound, but the thing is a bear to keep tuned. I have to crank the screws to where the knobs are hard to turn to keep the tuners from slipping. The headstock is over 15mm, several mm too thick for Gotoh UPT-L tuners. I considered using Gotoh banjo planetary tuners, but they are several ounces heavier than the UPT-L set. Grover has a set of banjo tuners they call "Perma Tension", but I don't see how they would be better than any other friction tuners. The holes in my peghead are too large for any of the geared peg tuners, and I'm not in favor of plugging and redrilling the headstock.

I have a set of Gotoh UK700 long post geared tuners that will fit, but before I install those, I want to make certain there are no other options for straight tuners that I haven't considered. Any thoughts?

TT

[JC Whitney]

Have you considered recessing the rear of the headstock (forstner bit?) a few mm at each hole, to get wood thickness down to 13.5mm for Grovel UPTLs? I'm envisioning that the large barrel part of the UPTLs would be countersunk into the back of the headstock. Perhaps use something along the lines of a "solid pilot counterbore bit" to insure concentricity?

[Tony Turley]

I have considered that JC, but I'd prefer not to modify the headstock if I can help it. That, and the fact that a good counterbore costs as much as a set of nice tuners.

[Carl Dickinson]

A step drill might work for that. Sets of those are pretty reasonable at Harbor Freight.