Fender 800 Tuning Machine stripped

Ian Worley · From: Sacramento, CA

I have an old Fender 800 and the tuning machine on string 8 has developed an issue. The brass gear on the tuning post is thrashed to the point that the worm gear skips when it hits that section. The worm gear on the knob stem is still fine.

On most guitars this would be no big deal, but these were built with the tuning machines mounted on a hidden plate beneath a metal pan. They seem to be kind of a one-off thing that Kluson built special for Fender, not an off-the-shelf sort of product, and not built with any future repairs in mind. The gear is pressure fit on the post, through the back plate (the end of the post is pressed to expand the end and lock the brass gear in place). There is no way to remove the gear short of drilling the end of the post out and finding another way to attach a new one.

I think I could remove the post and fit an individual machine in its place, assuming I can find one with a similar offset so the buttons would line up. The Klusons on my Emmons look similar and have the same button, but the stem is much larger and offset further from the base.

Any ideas/suggestions? Anybody have an old 800 parts guitar that they wouldn't mind parting with the tuners? A similar size shape/tuner/style in the parts drawer? Let me know. Thanks!

Brendan Mitchell · From: Melbourne Australia

I have heard you can swap out the worn parts from a reissue machine head .

Ian Worley · From: Sacramento, CA

Thanks Brendan, it does look like the old Gibson 3-on-a-plate style might work that way, the housing appears a bit deeper but the stem position and diameter seem to match. Sorting out the post is still the biggest hurdle to that approach.

But an update...

I found in my own parts box, an old pan style keyhead from a Sho-Bud Maverick that had been summarily destroyed by someone and I ended up with the parts. I forgot I had it, but the tuners are identical to the Fender. They had a bit of rust inside but I flushed them with acetone and injected some grease and they work fine. Not quite as smooth as the originals but at least they all work. They also had a thick layer of gunk on the nickel, perhaps years of cigarette smoke? I spent 5-10 minutes with the polishing wheel and they look fine now.

So in the immortal words of Emily Litella "never mind..."

Brendan Mitchell · From: Melbourne Australia

Serendipity

Jeff Mead · From: London, England

Those tuner pan assemblies on the 400s and 1000s are exactly the same as Stringmaster pans and I suspect the 800 pans are very close so if you do a search on repairing Stringmaster tuners you'll get a lot more hits.

I repaired one of my Stringmasters by replacing the strip with 4 individual vintage Kluson guitar tuners (they are held in place by the pan anyway). I had to drill a hole through the shaft for the string but it worked fine.

Ian Worley · From: Sacramento, CA

Thanks Jeff, it's sorted now. The way these things were assembled, removing and replacing one tuner is tricky business. They were not built with dis-assembly or repair in mind but the individual tuners as you mention are one solution. For the 800, the tuners from a Maverick pan are identical though. Good solution for anyone else who encounters a similar issue. A tuner pan setup from a Maverick or a later Sho-Bud/Fender might be easier to come by than one from an actual 800 or other old Fender. Here's mine with the cleaned, lubed and polished up Maverick keys in 6-10 and the crusty Maverick pan:

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