Planetary pegs?

harpmaker · Post by **harpmaker** » Mon Feb 13, 2006 11:04 am

As a luthier, I think a set of well made and well fitted wooden pegs are a thing of beauty. As a user, give me geared pegs everytime....

emmline · Post by **emmline** » Mon Feb 13, 2006 2:08 pm

harpmaker wrote:As a luthier, I think a set of well made and well fitted wooden pegs are a thing of beauty. As a user, give me geared pegs everytime....

I agree. I keep two of my old wooden pegs in my case for good luck.

Jay-eye · Post by **Jay-eye** » Sun Feb 19, 2006 3:19 pm

So is anybody currently retailing and fitting these planetary pegs in the UK?

kurami_rookwood · Post by **kurami_rookwood** » Sun Jul 08, 2007 12:26 pm

Is there any way to get planetary pegs that match boxwood fittings?
I really don't want to change everything to ebony.

awildman · Post by **awildman** » Sun Jul 08, 2007 4:51 pm

not currently. I have the same dilemma. I've emailed Knilling a couple of times about this, but have received no response. My feeling is that there are no plans to make rosewood or boxwood colors.

'course, an ebony tailpiece and chinrest aren't really that expensive, everything considering.

lordofthestrings · Post by **lordofthestrings** » Sun Jul 08, 2007 7:00 pm

Say what you will, I have never liked planetary pegs. The knilling "perfection" pegs are the best I've seen, but I don't ever use them. There's a brand called "caspari" which are total crap (Marketed as planetary, basically really terrible friction pegs) , and someone put them on a bunch of the instruments in the school district who I am the contracted luthier for (probably back in the early 90's). Such a bugger to fix, unstick... I've got tonnes of storys I could tell about planetary pegs and troubles I've had with them (planetary and non...)

Bushing peg holes can be a real nightmare, and more often than not, if done amaturely, can really screw up the structural integrity of an instrument, especially older ones with thinner peg boxes, and the olde style "pairs of 2" peg spacing. (that it, 2 pegs close together, a space, then the other 2, not 4 'equally' spaced pegs). The boxwood bushings can be troublesome, and I try to convince people to let me re ream their peg holes if there is a tuning problem before looking into planetary pegs. Really, a good set of pegs fit correctly on an instrument that is stored correctly and taken care of (temperature and humidity wise) shouldn't need planetary pegs. I know this is rarely the case, but a fine luthier should be able to fit pegs that turn easily and stay in place. I will install planetary pegs, but only on special request, or as a last resort.

Anyway, now that I've voiced dislike for "non traditional" pegs, I don't want to be a total hypocrite. The most recent private violin I made was requested to have vintage gear tuners installed: (the violin isnt quite that red, more rosey amber, the flash didn't help. roses hand painted by an old friend)

They work quite slick after a buffing and some TLC. These could be removed, the screw holes would need to be plugged, but the shaft holes are small, and could be reamed out for trad. pegs.

I've messed around with fitting different peg heads onto a set of discarded perfection pegs. I can graft different heads, but the shaft is still black. Not so great

!