Official Luthiers Forum!

Are you guys weighing the mini's or the regular sets? While I almost always go for the open backed tuners I usually always opt for the minis over the full sized ones when I use the closed back tuners.

I have some mini gotoh's ... I will weigh them tonight..

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

[QUOTE=Hodges_Guitars] just out of curosity, have any of you had customers balk at the idea of open back tuners? If I were looking at guitars in a music store, I would immediately bypass any guitar with open back tuners as being "cheap". They may work for a backpacker guitar or a friday night beater guitar, but I wouldnt put them on a guitar I wanted to get top dollar for.[/QUOTE]
I like em. Most guitars in music stores with open back tuners are cheap guitars to begin with. But if you use something like the waverlys or even the grover openbacks as sold on stew mac and elsewhere on a quality guitar i think they look great and work well. I like that old fasioned look to them.

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Guitars, guitars and more guitars.

My clients would never consider anything less than a fine open-back tuner by waverly, runber, alessi or perhaps National to a lesser extent. Closed back are manufactured much more cleaply.

Waverlys, Ivoroid:

 

National plate style, Ivoroid (to be fitted):

 

While it does seem that these tuners are lighter than the above pictured tuners, I dont think the extra weight at the head is a bad thing at all. A little weight at the right place can make an amazing difference to the quality of tone.

Tony

 

It would seem that the question in my original post has fully answered, and thanks to all of you.  The Sperzel open back tuners look fantastic...but where does one buy them?  Sperzel's web site is under construction and I can't find a single company (using Google) that lists them. 

Again, thanks for the dialog!  Lofton 

I sell Sperzel tuners and have some open back sets on hand.

Shane

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Canada

If you care...

the Gotoh 510 mini's with black plastic buttons are 171.5 grams. including screws washers and bushings.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

[QUOTE=LoftonHarris]

Regarding moon dust...

A Martin Backpacker was taken on one of the early Apollo space missions.  True to NASA policy, I'm confident that the effect of moon dust on the instrument was studied in detail...

When my wife saw the instrument, she suggested I fashion the headstock in the shape of a handle on a paddle as used for a canoe.  I suspect she was alluding to my lack of playing skills and the need for a more practical use for the guitar. 

For those who have not seen this guitar (although mine is serial number 149,XXX), I'll post pictures later this week.  Plus, I'm rather proud of my repair job. 

 

[/QUOTE]
Hi Yes the backpacker was the first guitar in space but it travel on the space shuttle Columbia not the Appolo Missions an never made it to the moon. Thats why i asked Moon Dust.

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Guitars, guitars and more guitars.

[QUOTE=Brock Poling]

If you care...



the Gotoh 510 mini's with black plastic buttons are 171.5 grams. including screws washers and bushings.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for weighing these Brock and I have been thinking of using them on a current project.

Thanks everyone for weighing tuners - wow the Waverly with ivoroid buttons are very light!