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I have only recently come across these. Seems like a good idea given the dangers of spikey string ends causing damage. Is there a reason they are not more commonly used?

Dave

I'd love to see a picture...

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Peter Havriluk

https://reverb.com/item/4686808-kluson- ... kd-3p-nmsp

The post is hollow, the string slips into it, and the slots secure the string to the post. I've used them on my travel guitars to eliminate the pesky pokey string ends when the neck is loose and being stuffed inside the body.

They used to be a lot cheaper.

Never heard of them, but it looks like a good idea. And at least Kluson, Wilkinson, and Gotoh make them, so patent probably expired. And actually will save time on my tuner-making project, since it can be machined from above. I'll give it a try

You guys have never heard of split post or safti-post tuners?

I guess they’ve only been around 75 years or so. You guys ever seen a Fender built prior to the late 70s???

In my view a split post is superior in every respect to either a round post tuner with a hole, or a modern locking tuner of any design. They aren’t generally accepted on flatttop guitars due to the aesthetic.

I think one reason Kluson closed back tuners were less popular was they were somewhat cheaply made and they didn't last as long as Grover's and Schaller's. The gear cover held the worm gear and provided the bearing surface for it and after it wore some was difficult to tighten up. It was also difficult to lubricate the gears because of the cover, so again they would wear more quickly.
Some improvements have been made over the years so the newer clones may be better than the originals.

Gibson did use Kluson's on some of it's flattop models as well as electric guitars.

I was amazed too and I'll add bass guitars have commonly used them for all of time.

But no one needs to suffer scratches to the instrument or pokes to the body from sharp strings ends. Cut the dang things off!

We cut them as close as we can and some people including Evan Gluck who was on the OLF back in the beginning and is NYC Guitar Repair twists the string a few times and breaks it off entirely at the hole.

Modern tuners (the last 60 years or so...) are tapered so that the winds tighten up with tension and "cinch" the string entering the hole and exiting the hole. No need for locks or knots or bends that are only going to get someone hurt come restring time AND increase the odds that you will scratch the guitar putting them on or taking them off.

You can also learn what pros do we use our thumb of our less dominant hand to push the string end upward and off the guitar as we tighten the tuner. We use drills to string and safed adapters that fit tuners so it all goes very fast.

Leaving a mark on a headstock never needs to happen and it is not difficult to learn to put strings on with zero damage to the instrument OR human.

Lastly one thing I don't like about this style of tuner is I know from experience how much slack to leave each string on different guitars. Different strings should have different number of winds. When I have to insert part of the string in a hole various tuner makers have different hole depths. It makes it difficult to know in advance how many winds will result when I lose some of the string off the bat to the hole.

Really lastly... here is a tip for you when stringing a Fender electric. Leo was a master of manufacturability but not so much on the guitar physics side... As such the break angle for his headstock design sucks.... He augmented the E and B with string trees because of this problem and later the company added trees for the G and D too.

If your Fender does not have a tree for the D and G what I do since the G is the most problematic without proper break angle is I make sure I have at least 6" of slack and no more than that and then I wind it all on the post. 6" is about the perfect amount that it can be neatly wound on the post, no overlaps so that the string exits the post very close to the head stock face creating the greatest possible break angle for that string. I've had clients call me up and ask me why I did this and then you hear the light bulb go off in their heads. This is a common practice in the trade, I did not invent it but I use it near daily.

It also aids in cutting the nut slots properly and very low since cutting the slots additionally reduces break angle this counters that.

Just checked to take a pic of the additional winds on the G and all of my Fender and Suhr stuff has short post tuners also invented to increase poor break angle on Fender Guitars so no pic for you.

A couple of pictures of Grover's version of the Kluson tuner showing the holes in the tuner posts and the back covers of the tuners. The Grover's seem a little better made than the Kluson's.

I've never heard them called safety tuners either. I do like that design quite a bit too. Even for repairs you can just pop them off and slide them right back on and tune up. Just had a guy in yesterday complaining about open buzz on the G-string. He only had like two wraps. I put a new string on, problem solved.

For the wound strings I cut them a bit more then two tuner posts ahead, 2.5 to be precise. The G gets 4 which is probably about 6in.

Hesh I am more familiar with nylon string guitars. I build steel strings sort of as a seperate discipline. So am interested in your view of the use of these tuners.


A pic of the way that you do your string windings on acoustic guitars would be useful.

Cheers Dave
In

Damm I did not see that you had put up a picture of your windings.

Ah well

Sure and for low tension strings like the low e only a few windings. I increase windings with pitch and tension AND if I want more break angle. Lots of folks are surprised to learn that you can increase break angle with more windings and it's necessary on some vintage Fenders.

The money part of the picture is seeing the string end cut very short preventing injury AND you can see the winds cinching upward capturing the string end on both sides of the post hole actually. No need for locks on modern steel string tuners with tapered posts.

How many windings is dictated by how much slack I have before I start winding and how much slack I have is a matter of experience for me having done this, strings guitars tens of thousands of time. So for a low e I might only have 2" of slack and for a G 4" or more.

I use a power drill with special adapter and if you have ever seen an Indy pit crew change tires that's what I look like changing strings it goes very fast and stay out of my way...

Classicals are a different animal and I always have to take a deep breath before tying the strings on one because I know it will take too long and slow me down. I pre stretch strings too when I put them on so tuning stability can be achieved by the player sooner. Classicals take forever to stretch compared to steel strings. Fortunately not much goes wrong with them because I really don't like working on them very much.

As far as strings and classicals go, I like to poke the string through the hole in the tuner barrel then come round in the direction of the wind and poke the string through the hole again then wind up. You just have to have a feel for how much slack you need to get a few winds. Can't do it with the E and often times A string because they are too thick but then those strings wind up easily on their own.

Thanks Hesh. When I am restringing my classicals I try to do it at the end of the day so they have the night to stretch and don't take quite so long over the following days to reach equilibrium.

Dave

I agree with the advantage of split post tuners but there are two locking tuner designs I've tried which also avoid the problem of sharp string ends. Both happen to be Ned Steinberger designs.

The Auto-Trim design is clever and effective: https://www.stewmac.com/parts-and-hardw ... -6-in-line

And the Gearless design has a very smooth tuning action, and the string ends are pulled into the shaft as you tune up: https://www.stewmac.com/parts-and-hardw ... ess-tuners

Yeah I use time too when I have it but I often have a customer coming to pick it up in an hour so I have to try to pre stretch manually. And I do pulling them out pretty far and holding for the count of five and repeating this for each string about ten times. Kind of a physical workout for me too... . I think I get about 80% of the stretch out. On steel strings I do the same thing and get a bit more of the stretch out.

My business partner tunes it intentionally sharp anticipating it will flatten out.

Just put some similar on an electric bass. Didn't know that they were "safety tuners", but i liked them.