Tuner buttons...my addiction

[jimmy bookout]

There are so many cool tuner buttons available these days I though I would show some on my guitars.

On the left, my Neil Gardiner Parlor with X-Gold Gotoh 510 Minis with Ebony/Koa MINI buttons from Bill Wise (Charis Guitars).
On the right, Neil Gardiner Concert with Cosmo Black Gotoh 510 Minis with Snakewood knobs from John Buscarino (Buscarino Guitars).






On the left, Taylor Leo Kottke with X-Gold Gotoh 510 Minis with Ebony/Koa (regular size) buttons from Bill Wise.
On the right, Avian Songbird with X-Nickel Gotoh 510 Minis with stock metal Gotoh knobs.

[chippygreen]

Originally Posted by jimmy bookout

There are so many cool tuner buttons available these days I though I would show some on my guitars.

On the left, my Neil Gardiner Parlor with X-Gold Gotoh 510 Minis with Ebony/Koa MINI buttons from Bill Wise (Charis Guitars).
On the right, Neil Gardiner Concert with Cosmo Black Gotoh 510 Minis with Snakewood knobs from John Buscarino (Buscarino Guitars).






On the left, Taylor Leo Kottke with X-Gold Gotoh 510 Minis with Ebony/Koa (regular size) buttons from Bill Wise.
On the right, Avian Songbird with X-Nickel Gotoh 510 Minis with stock metal Gotoh knobs.

I forgot how awesome the slotted headstocks on those early Avians are - such a cool guitar company.

[Wade Hampton]

Very cool, Jimmy. I have the same affliction: I love high quality aftermarket tuner buttons. They cut weight from the headstock because they weigh far less than the stock metal buttons, and they add visual contrast and a note of quiet elegance at the same time.

My current favorites are tortoiseshell plastic buttons on black Gotoh tuners. I get them in the Schaller button shape because that seems to fit in better with a wide array of headstock shapes.

I also have some snakewood buttons like the ones you have.

In the past I’ve mostly gotten the buttons from Allparts, and that’s definitely the best place to get them if you want to special order buttons in a shape and size that you’re not finding anywhere (if you want, say, full-sized grained ivoroid buttons for Gotoh tuners in the Schaller shape.) But these days Reverb.com is a great resource for aftermarket tuner buttons, too.

Anyway, nice photos, Jimmy.


Wade Hampton Miller

[jimmy bookout]

Originally Posted by chippygreen

I forgot how awesome the slotted headstocks on those early Avians are - such a cool guitar company.

They really are cool guitars and great for LOUD gigs (not so prone to feedback). I think they are out of business which is really too bad. The guitars clearly hit above their weight, price wise.

[jimmy bookout]

Thanks Wade. I have some ivoroid buttons in small Schaller shape and small Gotoh "tulip" shape. I think I'll try them on the Avian.
I'm not a huge fan of the "tulip" buttons although they're a little more palatable in the smaller size, IMO.

[Mark Hatcher]

I am a big fan of custom tuner buttons too. I make a lot of them from a variety of woods for my guitars. Sometimes I think I should take a couple of weeks and just make buttons.

This is sapwood capped Katalox wood on antique gold Gotoh 510 mini



Here's a set of two toned Ambyna burl:



The set went very well with this headstock:



I had fun making this Ebony/Bloodwood set for Gotoh Stealth tuners:



The buttons worked well, the tuners? not so much.

Mark

[AcousticDreams]

Originally Posted by Mark Hatcher

I am a big fan of custom tuner buttons too. I make a lot of them from a variety of woods for my guitars. Sometimes I think I should take a couple of weeks and just make buttons.

Here's a set of two toned Ambyna burl:


Mark

Huge, Huge Fan of two tone Amboyna! It was one of my personal favorites for a product I use to make.
Mark, those tuner buttons are absolutely gorgeous!

[dwasifar]

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

They cut weight from the headstock because they weigh far less than the stock metal buttons...

Is it that noticeable? How much weight difference is there?

[AcousticDreams]

Originally Posted by dwasifar

Is it that noticeable? How much weight difference is there?

And then there are the crazies = ME!, that think they can hear a difference in button materials. ha ha...

I have bloodwood, Ebony, Black Horn, bone, Brazilian Kingwood, Cocobolo & African Blackwood.

Feel wise, I love African Blackwood. Something about the feel of African Blackwood when you grip it, that is so very nice.

Looks wise Cocobolo is always a winner.Very Classy. Brazilian Kingwood, if you catch the stripes just right looks pretty cool

[Wade Hampton]

Originally Posted by dwasifar

Is it that noticeable? How much weight difference is there?

The full size metal buttons weigh quite a bit. It's definitely noticeable, especially on instruments besieged and beleaguered by too many tuners, like 12 string guitars.

In order to give you an accurate idea of the differentials, I just went to the kitchen and commandeered my wife's kitchen gram scale. It's an electric gizmo and reasonably accurate. I rummaged in my parts boxes and came up with some full sized buttons, both stock metal buttons and aftermarket buttons made of ebony and high grade plastic.

Here's what I learned:

The full sized Schaller stock metal button weighs 12 grams (which translates to 0.423288 ounces.) Multiply that by six and you get 72 grams, or 2.539728 ounces.

The full sized Grover Rotomatic button weighs exactly the same.

So stock full sized metal tuner buttons add slightly more than two and a half ounces to the headstock of a six string guitar, and about five ounces to the headstock of a twelve string.

Of course, the lighter weight aftermarket tuner buttons do weigh something, but it's significantly less: both the full sized Schaller style tortoiseshell plastic button and the grained ivoroid Gotoh "tulip" shaped button weigh 3 grams apiece, so 12 grams for a set of six, 24 grams for a twelve string.

In other words, it's 1/4 the weight of stock metal tuner buttons.

Interestingly, I had always assumed that wooden aftermarket tuner buttons weighed about the same as the plastic ones, but I was completely wrong: a full sized ebony Schaller style button weighs 6 grams, twice the weight of the plastic buttons.

Those ebony buttons weigh in at 36 grams for a set of six (1.26986 oz) while on a twelve string they're 72 grams (2.539728 oz.)

So wooden buttons weigh half as much as stock metal buttons, while plastic buttons weigh a fourth as much.

This may not seem like an immense amount of weight that we're discussing here, and it's not, but even so it's really noticeable when you do a before and after comparison hefting the guitar, particularly when you hold it in playing position. I've improved the physical balance of musical instruments many times by swapping out metal tuner buttons for lighter aftermarket buttons.

Thanks for asking, by the way - while I had done side by side comparisons weighing metal buttons and ebony, I'd never then weighed both plastic and wooden buttons. I learned something new this evening, namely that ebony buttons weigh twice as much as plastic!

Hope this helps.


Wade Hampton Miller

[dwasifar]

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

The full size metal buttons weigh quite a bit. It's definitely noticeable, especially on instruments besieged and beleaguered by too many tuners, like 12 string guitars.

In order to give you an accurate idea of the differentials, I just went to the kitchen and commandeered my wife's kitchen gram scale. It's an electric gizmo and reasonably accurate. I rummaged in my parts boxes and came up with some full sized buttons, both stock metal buttons and aftermarket buttons made of ebony and high grade plastic.

I kept my question deliberately vague so as not to influence what you might say about the benefits. I was wondering whether it was going to be all about weight balance, or if you would mention tone. You didn't, but K&G did, so it opens the question of whether you notice that.

I would expect any perceptible difference in tone to be all about mass and not at all about the actual material.

I really like some of the buttons OP showed, but I probably wouldn't buy them. Unlike OP, my guitars are not presentation instruments; just regular workaday guitars. Putting some of those beautiful fancy buttons on a satin-finish, maple-bound Larrivée would be like dressing your grandma at Frederick's of Hollywood. It's not that the Larrivée is not attractive, in its understated way. (I'm sure your grandma is a very handsome lady too.) But such decorative accessories might look out of place.

[Wade Hampton]

Dwasifar wrote:

Originally Posted by dwasifar

I really like some of the buttons OP showed, but I probably wouldn't buy them. Unlike OP, my guitars are not presentation instruments; just regular workaday guitars. Putting some of those beautiful fancy buttons on a satin-finish, maple-bound Larrivée would be like dressing your grandma at Frederick's of Hollywood. It's not that the Larrivée is not attractive, in its understated way. (I'm sure your grandma is a very handsome lady too.) But such decorative accessories might look out of place.

Dwas, my grandmother was considered the foremost beauty of Waubunsee County, Kansas when she was a gorgeous 19 year old redhead, but she died at age 76 in 1971, so her relative attractiveness is no longer an issue...

As for putting aftermarket tuner buttons on plain jane guitars like Larrivée's satin finish "3 Series" instruments, what I have on my 1998 OM-03W and my 2005 L-03R are ebony buttons on nickel Gotoh tuners. The ebony coordinates nicely with the ebony headstock veneer and fingerboard, and doesn't look the least bit ostentatious. Not in my opinion, anyway.

As for whether aftermarket tuner buttons can discernibly affect the tone of the instruments that they're on, I seriously doubt it. Whatever extremely slight impact they might have will relate entirely to the amount of mass involved.

Now, on a much smaller instrument like a mandolin, the amount of mass of the tuner buttons could conceivably have an impact on the tone that someone with good hearing might hear, even though it would be very slight. But mandolins CAN be influenced by added mass, which is why those incredibly crappy Gibson-style mandolin tailpieces stamped out of lightweight sheet metal persist, even though they're inarguably horrible to have to deal with. But they weigh practically nothing, and don't color the sound.

Thus their unmitigated horribleness gets passed down to yet another innocent, unsuspecting generation....

Getting back to the impact of tuner buttons on the sound, it's just barely within the realm of possibility that a lightly built guitar could be influenced by the presence or absence of metal tuner buttons, especially on a 12 string. But a discernible tonal difference between different aftermarket wooden tuner buttons made from different species of wood?

That seems unlikely to me, frankly, not with human hearing. Maybe if you're a bat navigating by sonar you might find you prefer the tone from one type of wooden tuner button over another....

But I have actually listened for tonal differences before and after swapping out tuner buttons, and honestly can't say that I've detected any. I do button swapping for the weight difference and the visual elegance that aftermarket buttons can bring. Using wooden or plastic buttons will also prevent the plating on gold-plated tuners from wearing off so easily - after all, the part of the tuner that gets touched by the player 99.99% of the time is the tuner buttons, and nothing else.

I've got gold plated Schaller minis on the 000-42 that Scott Baxendale built for me thirty years ago, and he put those white plastic pearloid buttons on them before shipping the guitar to me. A couple of years ago I replaced that original set of Schaller minis with an identical modern set because a couple of the old ones were starting to click and miss - they were starting to wear out, in other words.

But the plating on them still looked brand new!

That wouldn't have been the case if the original stock metal buttons had been on them for thirty years, or even for three or four.

Hope that makes sense.


Wade Hampton Miller

[sleeperservice]

Well,thanks a bunch;-D.just as i start to relax the suicide watch on my wallet as guitar GAS seems to be satisfied,along comes a post that opens yet another door to to the world of "gotta have". Some absolutely beautiful craftsmanship on show here. Great post.thanks.

[Mark Hatcher]

Originally Posted by Knives&Guitars

Huge, Huge Fan of two tone Amboyna! It was one of my personal favorites for a product I use to make.
Mark, those tuner buttons are absolutely gorgeous!

Thanks! Amboyna really is a pleasure to work with. It's hard, stable, has nice contrast, it doesn't choke up sandpaper (like Thuya burl), and it smells like cotton candy when you work it!
Were you using it for knife scales?

[HOF dad]

Originally Posted by sleeperservice

Well,thanks a bunch;-D.just as i start to relax the suicide watch on my wallet as guitar GAS seems to be satisfied,along comes a post that opens yet another door to to the world of "gotta have". Some absolutely beautiful craftsmanship on show here. Great post.thanks.

Ha......I know what you mean. I never considered this option but there are some really gorgeous buttons in this thread.
By comparison, this is an affordable upgrade (at least I think it is - I haven't researched any prices).
Good stuff