Violin Forum/Message Board

[John Cadd]

The incredible prices of Bois d`Harmonie tailpieces come as a shock .£600 .--for a tailpiece?
One version eliminates the insert or Fret and uses the Wittner type string end support. Drilling holes further back makes it easier to maintain the afterlength . I tried that trick several years ago . It`s just a 4 mm hole drilled about 15 mm further back from the standard hole position.Then the fine tuner head pops up just behind the insert fret. The narrow slot has to be widened (or vandalised) to allow for movement when tuning .The afterlength is more accurate than sticking forwards .With the variety of tailpiece woods the weight can vary so there is no need to worry about the exact weight . Better to measure the distance from fret to tail loop exit point and then use a stranded steel loop to stop any stretching .
The Stradpet tuners come in long and short sizes. but they both keep the string end at the right height. The tuners that sit on top of the tailpiece alter the string angle over the bridge. They raise the E string about 5 mm and when you look across the tailpiece it looks bizarre .I would only recommend using loop ends on them The ball ends add to the misalignment. Precise weight calculations have to give way to mechanical forces and angles just behind the bridge. If a lightweight rosewood tailpiece is combined with an 8 gram adjuster it might not matter . I have one 8 gram adjuster in a spares box . It`s an incredible thing . I would be afraid to use it . I have a "heavy" harp shaped tailpiece in Palm wood and with an adjuster and tail loop it still weighs 4 grams less than a Wittner with 4 adjusters .
One thing I have noticed missing about fine tuners is my habit of pressing the string inside the pegbox with my thumb nail .It is useful to make a final tweek . Nobody ever told me to do that and it may be a bad habit.After tuning there may be some extra tension inside the pegbox compared to the main string . Graphite in the nut slot may make than same alteration .

[John Cadd]

A film of David and Igor Oistrakh in the Sinphonia Concertante K364 shows David Oistrakh`s Viola with one fine tuner.One that sticks out just like a school violin.
Igor Oistrakh had two fine tuners on his Violin.On the A and E strings .Nobody thought to criticise that .
I looked for that performance because I wanted to compare the sound of this piece by Mozart. I had just heard a BBC broadcast with James Ehnes and Antoine Tamestit .The microphone positions made the French Horns destroy the composition. I needed to check how bad my hearing was .

[John Cadd]

It might seem strange to find so many different fine tuners mentioned. But these tuners are rarely plug and play . You need to figure out how each one works----after you manage to fit the things that is . Mechanically they can be stiff . Hidden traps with split fixing screws bending under pressure just as you thought they were spot on .Fitting with uneven tailpiece surfaces provides yet more hoops to jump through . Then after they are fitted ,maybe a Hill tuner will break the string because they forgot to smooth out rough edges.Doh.What are they like?
For myself it was a bit like watching a grand master chess player video running through basic openings . Curiosity got the better of me .
So final verdict is avoid the tuners that raise the string and spoil the string angle over the bridge. Keep the use of fine tuners to a minimum setting and learn how to tune with the pegs even if you need to do that at home before coming out . Parents can help with that .

[John Cadd]

Received today 4 Hill style fine tuners but these were made in Germany .And not just Germany --West Germany from back in the era of John Kennedy . These have West Germany stamped on the adjuster screw .I still had some work to do . On an ebony tailpiece I needed to embed them into the tailpiece bottom so the screw thread poked up far enough to attach the fixing collar .Edgar Russ had the same job on his video . But mechanically these are perfect . They are designed for a loop E string . Looking closely at the hook you see the slot has been filed straight across and for a steel E string that gives two sharp right angles which E strings dislike . I rounded the edges with a diamond file .There is a new hook type of attachment to cater for loop ends.But all credit to our German friends who designed these so carefully .

[John Cadd]

When you need to use a fine tuner the smoothest action is the best .Thin,or narrow screw tops are not comfortable when your attention is directed at the music .So after the run through of several tuners I fall back to the older traditional design with a lever underneath the tailpiece. Lets face it ,even David Oistrakh used one of these in a recording . The "lever - under "type are so smooth because the screw has far less pressure to move the lever a tiny amount.Modern lightweight Hill style tuners try to bypass that pressure by making large tops on the screw. But saving weight can be balanced by choosing a lighter tailpiece material .The worrying about weight almost clashes with a preference for ebony .Ebony is widely accepted as a traditional tailpiece material but it is heavy compared to rosewood. Generally I notice Rosewood tailpieces are cut much thinner than Ebony.
Boxwood is somewhere in between . I have a boxwood tailpiece that was used with a lever -under tuner and the front end still has a dent where the ball end was pressing on the tailpiece and stopping it working . So I cut a piece out .That was close to the time ball ends were being used for the first time .That`s a bit historical now .
I did an adaptation on a rosewood tailpiece by drilling a new hole further back to get the string hook just behind the insert.The E string ends at the insert level and the loop around the hook allows the afterlength to be very accurate . Always remove a tailpiece before any drilling please .
The new hole further back predates the Bois d`Harmonie style . Those tailpieces are like the Wittners with built in tuners . They do not cater for E string loops.