Why Gotoh?

[zortation]

Welcome zortation,
 I just have to smile at you responding to a thread from 2002,
14 years...that must be some kind of record 


play healthy,
Elwood

Oh...missed that. Ah well


 

[bigredbass]

Back in the 70's and 80's, Schaller surely set several world records for being back-ordered on just about anything you could want from their catalog.  They were very big on the OEM side of the business (IF you were a very big customer, Gibson was their meal ticket for years), and very thin on the jobber side.  While they still make excellent products, that style of business opened the door for Gotoh in a big way.  Grover has always been asleep at the switch despite obvious classics like Imperials.  These days with HipShot and others, Schaller is just not the monolithic only-game-in-town they once were, and in my experience, Gotohs are equal.

Over my years looking over the counter, a good 90% of walk-ins with the complaint, 'this #&&%#*@ thing won't stay in tune' was caused by simply not knowing how to properly string the instrument, and in the other 10%, I've never seen any brand's sealed / gear-driven keys fail.

Joey

[poor_nigel]

There is more than gear ratio to consider on your machines.  Schallers have a small barrel to wind your strings on, so up take maybe the same on their 12:1 ratio as a 20:1 ratio of a Gotoh large barrel machine.  I prefer the larger barrel, as I seem to break less strings on them.  I prefer Gotoh tuners on my Alembics as they switch out with Hipshot Ultralites with no modifications what-so-ever.  Schallers have a much small mounting hole, so they are not switchable with Gotohs.  Just FYI.  Everyone has their own prefs.

[pauldo]

Interesting zombie thread (back from the dead).  I am out of town and not sure what is on my Distillate.  I do know (pardon the politico speak) that Japan is preferred over China anytime with me - that is simply based on my 1981 Yamaha XJ650 Maxim; it was/ is a finely engineered machine to the point of being impressive with all of the well thought out details.

[Exploiter007]

My '83 Distillate Exploiter has Schallers.  Know what I got a kick out?  They are stamped "Made In W. Germany." 

[edwin]

There is more than gear ratio to consider on your machines.  Schallers have a small barrel to wind your strings on, so up take maybe the same on their 12:1 ratio as a 20:1 ratio of a Gotoh large barrel machine.  I prefer the larger barrel, as I seem to break less strings on them.  I prefer Gotoh tuners on my Alembics as they switch out with Hipshot Ultralites with no modifications what-so-ever.  Schallers have a much small mounting hole, so they are not switchable with Gotohs.  Just FYI.  Everyone has their own prefs.

Nothing a cello reamer can't handle in 20 minutes or so.