Advice on Tuners

[levin4now]

I was considering a number of upgrades to my mandolin. I was wondering what the advantage of better tuners is? Do they not slip out of tune? Are they smoother when tuning? When I tune my mandolin, it seems there I sometimes have to detune a string drastically to get it to 'move' and then I can tune up to the proper point, subtle adjustments don't always work it seems. I had a new nut put in place when the instrument was set up. Perhaps the slots aren't quite cut right.

My mandolin is a Michael Kelly mandolin that I've had for about 2.5 years, or is it 3.5? I bought it prior to them being sold in stores. I hear they now have Grover tuners. Does anyone know what they were before that?


Any info would be appreciated.

I can't afford WAverly's and am not looking at doubling the cost of my instrument! Wondering what is affordable....

[Michael Lewis]

Most probably your current machines are OK. Most tuning problems are caused at the nut. The slots must be cut wide enough to properly fit the strings, angled properly, and lubed with graphite. Most often the plain strings are the sticky ones, but they all can benefit from the "pencil rub".

[John Flynn]

I agree on the idea of looking at the nut first. That is much more likely to be the problem. The "pencil rub" may help, but it may not. Sometimes, you need to get a luthier to make adjustments. My luthier has really improved the tuning machine action on one of my mandos and my guitar by not only adjusting the slot widths and angles, but also filing down the top of the nut so that 1/3 to 1/2 of string diameter is above the nut and the strings are not "buried" in the nut slots.

However, if the instrument has "economy" tuners, they can be a problem also. A great buy in tuners are the Grover Sta-Tites, as opposed to the more expensive Grover Deluxe tuners. They can be found at the link below as #G304C, for $20.50. They replace the economy tuners exactly, but they are much higher quality and very consistent.
http://www.internationalluthiers.com/machineheadsp3.php

[levin4now]

Thanks for the advice...I just changed strings last night, or else I'd have tried the pencil rub right then!

There are things I'd like to upgrade on this mandolin (tuners, tailpiece), but would might rather save for a whole mandolin upgrade when the time presents itself!

Alan