Locking Nut Alternatives

whitebison66

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I need to mate a Superwide 1 7/8" neck with a Floyd Rose bridge. There are no 6-string locking nuts that wide, and I am not even sure I can find a graphite nut blank that wide either. So what tuners would you recommend? I don't really expect to get the same kind of sounds with the bridge (i.e. I know the strings probably won't dump to slack), but I'd like to find the next-best-alternative. Thanks in advance!
 
When push comes to shove, I think I prefer the Schaller locking tuners to the Planet Waves - they just feel more solid, and the strings come off them at a lower angle. Stew-Mac has a "Slipstone" blank that's 1 7/8":
http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Nuts,_saddles/String_nuts/Slip-Stone_Nuts.html
Another thing you can do is buy an graphite acoustic bridge saddle, and saw away....
http://www.wdmusic.com/tusq_1_8_compensated.html

I bought some sheet 1/8" graphite thinking I was getting over on the big guys (and their ten-frikkin'-dollar blanks), but it's softer than I thought it was going to be. It still works, but I don't know for how long... I put plain old bone on my non-locked Warmoth seven-string, and as long as it's shaped well and lubed there's no binding. I'm not violent, I just play odd little Beckisms now and then.
 
The Schaller Mini Locking Tuners have the hole for the strings at a much lower profile than most conventional tuners, so the break angle is slightly increased.  This is of help to straight headstocks such as strats.

We have soloist in the office with the abovementioned headstock style, which utilizes a straight string pull over the nut.  It has a Original Floyd Rose trem and SML tuners, with a white corian nut.

It's had a pretty decent setup job done on it when one of the staff took it home for the weekend.

For the life of me, I cannot get it to go out of tune, even with the most Vai-ish wammy abuse, pressing it completely sharp to the point that it frets out and the saddle clamp bolts touch the floor of the recessed route, to the opposite extreme of dive-bombing to total string slack.

What does all of this prove?

Locking Tuners, in conjuction with a good bridge design, in conjunction with a straight string pull, in conjuction with a well performed setup job, will yield and instrument that will stay in tune, and do so consistently.

Hopefully that is of some help.
 
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