This may sound dumb, but bear in mind that I have never worked on any other mandolin than the one I have. I have a 2003 Washburn Jethro burns that I bought new, and in the last few weeks I have been doing some work on it, with the help of some good advice from the forum. About two weeks ago I was doing some final touch up work on a saddle that I had inlaid a piece of bone in, during that process I had one of the tuner buttons, some kind of plastic pearl looking material, crumble off. So, I happened to have some bone lying around and I decided to make a bone tuner button. This was pretty much of a job with nothing but hand tools, but it came out so well that I decided to make a whole set--which is a subject for another post. In the process of making the buttons I caused myself another problem.
First, I do not know what brand of tuners this mandolin has. I checked the Washburn site, and did not find what I was looking for. I emailed Washburn, and the message I got back was "call to order the tuners." So, I assume they are some brand common to the pacrim instruments. Anyway, on the shaft that the button screws to there is what I call a "top hat spacer" that goes between the button and the tuner plate(I hope I am using the correct nomenclature). Between the part of the spacer that goes next to the body is a tiny nylon/plastic washer. Frankly these things are so thin and clear that I did not realize they were there until I happened to have one come off with the top hat spacer.
Once I knew they were there I was very careful to try not to lose any of them. Not careful enough as at the very last I lost one of them. I called Washburn to see if I could get some of these things, the answer I got was "buy a set of tuners, no small parts available". I certainly am not going to buy a set of tuners when mine are working ok, and even if I did I would buy upgrade to a better set.
I did some looking around and found some nylon washers at Ace Hardware that are almost perfect, except for the thickness. so I sanded one down-removing my fingerprint from a couple fingers in the process by the way- polished it, lubed it up, and tried it, and it seems to work alright- maybe a tiny bit stiffer. I intend to take one of the real ones off and measure it and get the exact thickness since I just eyeballed the one I sanded down, so I do not really think I need to try to get the exact replacement. Unless the original washers are some kind of super-duper unobtainable material. However, my question is this...
Is this small washer, which I suspect is to make the tuner operate smoother by reducing friction, something that is common to mandolin tuners? Or is it something used on the less expensive tuners to make up for the bearing surfaces not being smoothly polished? If this is the case, then are the better tuners polished better, thus making the washer unnecessary? I found an excellent post by Paul on tuner maintenance, and I am going to do this to mine in a few days since I have a string change coming up and once I find some of the TriFlow lube that he recommends, and maybe some kind of polishing compound. But I am curious about this washer and I am also interested in hearing what others may have used as a replacement.
Thanks to all who respond,
Terry
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