Fender LSR Roller Nuts, Good/Bad Experiences?

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 16 Jan 2013, 03:47

Hi everyone,

I just recently bought myself a Fender LSR Roller Nut from eBay which I'm going to use to replace the existing nut on my Mexican Standard Strat, and I was just wondering if anyone has had any experiences with one of these good or bad, there's a 3-part series of videos on youtube dealing with installing an LSR Roller-Nut on a Strat, it looks easy enough and I feel confident enough to do the installation myself, since I have some formal training as a Fitter and Machinist, and I understand how important it is to get the nut in the correct position......

What's the tuning stability like?, I'm using 46-10 guage strings and as I understand the maximum guage is 56 on the low-E string....

GuitarlCarl · Post by **GuitarlCarl** » 16 Jan 2013, 13:55

With the roller nut or even a good slippery bone nut, grooved right, the tuning stability will be as good as the way you wrap your strings on the tuners and how close to neutral your string tension is compared to your trem springs... check that http://www.frudua.com guy he knows strats...

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 16 Jan 2013, 22:01

Cheers GuitarlCarl, I've got the website bookmarked now, I'll have a good look at all the stuff on the site.....

Post by **abfackeln** » 17 Jan 2013, 01:25

Installed one of the LSR rollers on my cheap Mexican strat that would never stay in tune, even though I'm not a heavy bar user. Stayed in tune much better after the install. Then I stumbled across this:

http://www.strat-talk.com/forum/stratoc ... uning.html

Set it up that way, and stays perfectly in tune nearly 100% of the time, even with heavy bar use (string wrap definitely important). Took it a step further with just a two spring set up and now I feel like Jeff Beck, although all I seem to be able to make are wailing cat noises......

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 17 Jan 2013, 01:57

Cheers for that, I might try what the guy in the video clip suggests, I've thought alot about what could be causing my tuning issues on my strat, and I keep coming to the same conclusion that it's friction in the nut that's the cause, so when I get my Fender LSR nut in the mail I'm going to install it on my guitar after I've read all I can on LSR nut installation, just so I'm absolutely sure I'm familiar with the installation procedure.....

GuitarlCarl · Post by **GuitarlCarl** » 17 Jan 2013, 03:52

Familiarity, with any installation is a good idea. I know that correctly slotting the nut, to the extent of a funnel like slot in the back, to a correct depth slot in the front, and using something slippery in the slot itself, really makes a big difference. I'd be willing to bet on the rollernut, sight unseen. Many folks swear by locking tuners too, but I wrap my strings so they won't slip so I've never used the locking type. Stretch tune, stretch tune, etc, until it stays in tune and on to the next has served me well. I also set mine up as a floating trem, and have tweaked the spring tension by adjusting the claw, so that my claw is at an angle pulling more on the low E side, where there is more tension from the thicker strings. I too, use 10 - 46 sets like you mentioned before. Truthfully, I have an old SG with a crap spring bar trem with an arm from an old teisco, that even stays fairly well in tune because of attention to the nut, and stringing it like I do. That tremolo is the biggest POS, but breaking in the strings as you put them on makes a big difference. And a slippery nut, can't forget the slippery nut...

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 17 Jan 2013, 05:21

I'll keep you guys posted on how it all pans out, I guess I'm still learning when it comes to trem setups, cheers GuitarlCarl.....

Also, I was wondering if it was worth trying a set of 6 Steinberger Gearless Tuners?, apparently they are very precise, equivalent to a sealed machine tuner with a 40:1 gear ratio, most standard tuners offer an 18:1 gear ratio, so you can see how precise Gearless Tuners are.....

http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Tuners/Guit ... uners.html

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 31 Jan 2013, 02:05

I just received my new Fender LSR Roller Nut in the post yesterday, going to work out what tools I need and buy them before I start installing the nut cause I want to make sure I do the job right....

matt239 · Post by **matt239** » 20 Jun 2013, 08:27

How did it turn out Doc?

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 26 Jun 2013, 06:43

matt239 wrote:How did it turn out Doc?

Didn't seem to make as much of a difference as I thought it would to be honest, I even tried some lubricant on the ball bearings too and I still had return-to-pitch tuning problems, I need to buy a replacement neck for my strat and was going to replace the original with an all-maple neck anyway.....

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 03 Nov 2013, 19:30

Update:

After buying a new all maple neck for my Strat and ending up with the G-String buzzing like a sitar after using 42-09 nut-slot files to file the slots to the correct depth to give .018 inch clearance at the first fret (Fender Spec), I decided to have another go at installing an LSR Roller-Nut, the reason being is that the nut installed on the neck had shallow nut-slots pre-cut in it, unfortunately the positions of the slots means that instead of passing through the nut dead-straight, the strings actually bend sideways towards the tuners, I found that not only it the cause of the G-String Buzzing, it's also causing tuning stability issues....

This time round I'm going to be a lot more careful when doing the LSR Nut Installation.....

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 13 Nov 2013, 09:14

Update:

The new Fender LSR Nut came in the mail today so I went to work installing it on the maple neck, I managed to do a better job of it than I did last time, and the overall result looks a lot better than before, the nut is fitting more snugly in the slot, this time round I didn't strip the head on one of the mounting screws like I did the last time.....

Okay, so with the original tuners and vintage style bridge the guitar seems to be a bit more stable in tuning, some of the strings still go out but I'm blaming that mostly on the original tuners which have some backlash and are probably wearing-out, and the string tree, so, I'm going all-out and getting rid of anything which could be causing the strings to go out of tune, I've ordered a Bladerunner bridge from Super Vee.com, basically the Bladerunner bridge is similar to traditional-style Strat bridges except that it pivots on a small thin piece of spring steel, this eliminates friction where the traditional Strat-Bridge pivots against 6 screws, the result is that the Bladerunner Bridge returns much better to the neutral position where the spring-tension balances out the string tension, I also ordered a set of Fender Locking tuners from Amazon.com to replace the original tuners, incidentally, I'm actually starting to really like Locking Tuners and the whole concept behind them, firstly they make re-stringing your guitar quicker since you don't need to have many winds around the capstan, secondly because you don't need to wind the string that eliminates one of the other causes of tuning instability, when you wind a string around the tuning capstan,bring it up to pitch, and then use the Trem bar, the windings loosen when the string tension drops and then tighten when the string tension goes back up, during this loosening and tightening of the windings, they shift positions on the tuning capstan with the result that sometimes the string will come back to pitch either sharp or flat, this is aggravated by any friction in the slots cut in the nut, and also any backlash in the tuners, Locking Tuners usually exhibit zero, or near zero backlash when new....