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Replacing a 5th String Friction Tuner. The curse of the modern El Cheapo banjo, the friction peg was still hanging around on the world's finest instruments until after World War II. What a pain, though! The geared 5th string tuner was the greatest thing to happen to the 5-string banjo since Earl Scruggs. Many modern imported banjos still use these, though. For a total savings of only around $6.00 per banjo for the importer, I still marvel at why the damn things are still being made. Meanwhile, here is where I come in handy. The shafts of these tuners are narrow and never tapered, in my experience. Some friction tuners that came on Gibson banjos had a set screw on one side of the shaft and you can't simply pull them out, but on this one we are safe to do just that. Without assistance from a tool, this one pulls right out. You can see that the new, geared tuner isn't going to fit the existing hole and must be reamed. The shaft on the new tuner is tapered as well and you must have a tapered reamer of the correct size to do this job. I made this one from an existing reamer, but they are available through luthier supply companies.
The reamer is matched perfectly, but the hole left by the original tuner is too small to allow the reamer we need for the final fit to get started. Drilling the hole with the proper size twist drill bit would work, but I have a set of reamers of lots of different sizes so I gently enlarge the hole with one that will allow me to get started. The tape that is on the reamer stays on this reamer because I use it for a stop when setting tuning machines on new banjos I build and it has nothing to do with the job at hand. I ream the old hole only enough to get the proper reamer started. Pay close attention while shaping the hole if you try this yourself. The taper should allow you to tap the unit in and get a tight wedge fit without glue, but not so tight to split the neck. This is where experience helps.
Instead of finishing this series here, I suggest that you read my series on removing a stubborn 5th string peg for the rest of the information necessary to complete this task by clicking Here.
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