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Before I ever used them on a guitar I thought I'd better figure out a way of getting them out if I needed to. I glue them in with Titebond, used sparingly. This seems to act mainly as a thread former than a glue. To get them out, pass an old steel A or E wound string through the hole and wrap it around the string post, opposite way from "normal". Use a pair of pliers to grab the wound string over the post (the string protects the post from being damaged by the pliers) and apply torque to both the string post and the grip. I tried this a few times on a dummy headstock and got the pegs out without damaging them.

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

I had a bit of fish glue on the thread, that's all. Mot of them went out with little effort (pliers and leather) but 2 would not budge until I discarded the leather (tried several sorts) and had the teeth bite into the alu.

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Build log

Trev thanks for the heads up abt the alum /composite nature of the pegs , and the 9mm gtr peg.good advice.Was only speculating that there might be some humidity issues with wood in the( peghed),having never seen one or used one before .Will try a set of the 9mm and see how they work.

I've been using them for a bit over 6 years .
They can be tricky to get to fit right.
They can loosen .
they can become almost so stiff you can't tune with them.
Sometimes the braking mechanisim does not work to full capacity.

I think there is a quality control problem with them.
But when they're good they are the best
.
Wooden pegs like the wood they are fit to swell &
shrink with the humidity.

I like the 4 to 1 ratio of the Pegheds.
Yah the others tune fast-many times too fast!
They're 1 to 1

I just wish the maker followed up with the
users to see if there was any problems.
But he's a bit aloof.

Mike

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Mike Collins

We are free to prefer whatever neck joint, but I wouldn't call the Spanish neck joint a primitive and inferior method of construction. It offers a solid, easy, reliable, and very consistent attachment. If neck resets were a real problem on classical guitars, it would have been discarded a long long long time ago.

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Build log

I totally agree with that. The reason many have gone to bolt ons and other methods, is ease of construction, and possibly somewhat easier set-up. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, but the reasons are rarely for ease of neck re-setting.

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Waddy

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Sound Clips of most of my guitars

I agree with Waddy and Alex on this one.
For me (having had previous and copious experience with separate neck constructions) adopting the Spanish foot style of assembly was most applicable to a shop not particularly "tooled up" in that truly excellent results can be had with a very simple set up.

I have to say though, choosing a neck joining system and building a truly successful classical guitar are as far apart as learning to put the key into the ignition and becoming an expert driver.

I just got my harp ukulele switched over to planetary gear pegs. Knilling violin pegs, rather than flamenco pegheds (since I needed 8, the shorter length looks better on this one, and they're a bit cheaper). Being that it's steel string, wood pegs are quite difficult to tune since the strings are so inelastic. Aside from a bit of difficulty installing (due to using them differently than they're designed for), the geared pegs work great. Still fairly touchy since it's only a 4:1 ratio, but accurate enough.

I don't think I'd bother with them on nylon string guitars since wood pegs work just fine (at least so far... I haven't been through a full year of seasonal variation yet), but they would be nice. I think the 4:1 ratio would be just about perfect for nylon strings. It's a little low for steel, but most machine heads are a little high for nylon, IMO. Too much work winding the strings on and off.

But you might as well keep a set around incase you get a customer who doesn't like wood pegs. Much easier than converting to a slot head, plus they're not much heavier than wood pegs so it won't throw off the balance.

I could bring my harp uke over tomorrow or whenever, if you want to get an idea what they feel like. Or just for the heck of it, since I haven't been over in a while, and you mentioned it in that other thread

Dennis Tomorrow morning . is fine .would love to see you an the uke.Firing up my weber bbq grill using sycamore, for grilled burgers, veggies homemade wood fired bbq flat bread and hot dogs /no nitrates. Will be at the gym between 9-11 ,will pm you with my fone number cheers ernie

Deniss brought over 2 instruments on monday one with knilling planetary pegs, and a gtr with a set of traditional rosewood pegs.The planetary pegs are a little difficult to fit , but probably hold better.But I must say I do prefer the look of traditional wooden pegs,The planetary pegs look cold and plastic like to me .So for aesthetics I guess the traditional pegs win, and for functionality the planetary pegs are better.