The aesthetics of tuner placement and peghead edges.

[Doug Shaker]

I am planning a new peghead design and thinking about how to place the tuners with respect to the edge of the peghead. Theoretically, any placement that allows the tuner knob to turn and which allows the flat bottom of the tuner to firmly bed on the peghead would work, but that leaves about 11 mm of variability.

On the Gotoh tuners that I am using, from the body of the tuner outwards, there is
- a tapered section (diameter tapering from 9mm to 5mm), the same color as the body of the tuner, about 8mm long
- a series of washers in various colors, about 5mm in diameter, about 2.5mm thick.
- a narrow section of the knob, that matches the width of the washers, about 1 mm thick.

When you design a peghead, how do you choose to line the tuners up with the peghead edge?

Just askin'...

[Bob Gramann]

I choose to not have the longer strings interfere with the closer tuners. After that, it comes down to how you want it to look both for the shape of the peghead and for the placement of the tuners.

[Barry Daniels]

There is a sweet spot. The button should stick out far enough to provide clearance for the button itself and your fingers (or string winder) to clear the headstock. But you don't want to have the tuner too close to the edge. I usually go by eye, moving the tuner around until it looks right.

[Doug Shaker]

I choose to not have the longer strings interfere with the closer tuners. After that, it comes down to how you want it to look both for the shape of the peghead and for the placement of the tuners.

My design philosophy dictates that I try to have the strings be straight pulls through the nut to the tuners. I want the strings to be as easy to tune accurately as possible and straight pulls help with that.

[David King]

As a side note a very steep side pull actually has some effect on the tone. It might be worth experimenting with this.

[Brian Evans]

I mount the tuners so they are parallel to the axis of the neck. The knobs stick out at 90 degrees to the center line of the neck, so not following any curve that I have in the sides of the headstock. My preference is to minimize side angle over the nut, but I will sacrifice that to the gods of style...

Brian