Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

Hello all ...

Maurice the machine had a 12 string commission.
Back / sides IRW
Top Sitka
Bindings Tas BW
Plays great ... sounds fantastic

Peter

What a bloody clever way of doing a 12 string peg head.

Allen wrote:What a bloody clever way of doing a 12 string peg head.

Exactly my thoughts!

Yes ... The customer had seen something like it on a Rickenbacker electric.
He liked the look of it rather that the traditional long headstock.
All credit to Maurice to nut it all out and execute the build.

Pete

Superb work as always Mauri...thanks for posting Pete, very inspirational.

Good things happening in the west again, and that headstock is insane Mauri.

Steve

I need time to digest that headstock. Its a bit like walking around a corner and running into Jesus

It was done at the request of the owner, wanting 12 tuners on a standard size headstock similar to Rickenbacker 12 strings.
I was hesitant at first but told him I would give it a go with an all care but no responsibility attitude. I had concerns with strength of the headstock, function difficulty of the tuners and clear string paths. I drew it up full size and this indicated that tuners with a small footprint and long shafts would be required to leave enough meat after drilling for the tuners. The longest and smallest tuners that I could find readily available were Schaller M6 Mini. As it turns out I would have been happier with longer shaft tuners to increase the headstock thickness and the distance from the edge to the slot.
Tuning up was a lot easier than I anticipated. On the bass side, normal tuners are the main strings and slots are the octaves. On the treble side it is the opposite.
The 6 pin bridge works a treat also, even if a bit more challenging at first string up. Thanks to Craig and Martin for putting me onto this.
Cheers Maurice

Hi Mauri
I'm impressed also by that feat of engineering and 3D design. Would you do it again, or recommend it to another customer?
Mark

Hi Mark
Yes I would do it again and recommend it, providing I could obtain long shaft tuners with a small foot print.
Schaller M6 Minis are only 13mm wide which is great, but the threaded retaining screw length is the restriction.
Open tuners with a press fit bushes would be the way to go but the smallest body width I could find was 17mm which means the headstock thickness must be a min of 18mm. This means the shaft length is then too short.
I have heard that some tuner manufacturers do make longer shafts so I will check this out for future builds.
Cheers Maurice

Not your regular wingnut style, but perhaps Steinberger's gearless 40:1 straight through tuners would do the trick for you Mauri...

http://www.stewmac.com/Hardware_and_Par ... ml#details





And then there's Gotoh's Stealth..these maybe interesting to you because they can be 'imbedded' into the headstock..an overlay held in place by a couple of small re magnets to cover the bodies of the tuners...and you would never know..that'll have'm scratch'in their heads

http://www.g-gotoh.com/international/?page_id=2232









Cheers

Kim

I initially thought about stealth tuners based on their small body size, but felt they may not handle the tension of 12 to 53 strings.
However I have just checked them out and find they will handle 20kg of tension. Amazing.
This would make them ideal, apart from their cost.
Cheers Maurice

Wow!, What a gorgeous instrument.