Hello and a question on restringing Gearless tuners.

[Richjevons]

Hi everyone, my Name’s Rich.
I’ve been a professional touring guitarist for about 15 years. Owned a Carter Starter years ago but didn’t quite take to it.

When the pandemic hit last year I started doing some work as a landscape gardener and badly injured my index finger on my left hand. My Dad very kindly suggested he bought a pedal steel and I could be practicing that whilst I was out of action playing 6 string.

Im now hooked!

I have a question regarding re stringing a Sierra with Gearless tuners, I’m finding it very hard to pull the string tight enough to get the string up to pitch as there isn’t enough thread on the tuners I’ve managed every string but the top G# and can’t help feel like I’m being thick on a way to do it?

[Mr Bassman]

Welcome to the forum Rich.
Maybe you should ask that question in the technical section.

[Danny Mitchell]

Hello Rich,
So, you're hooked! Join the club!
There's a section about stringing in this manual, hope it might help.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1quG_KfF-NRwJoIVBTI68213fg5NgdDG8/view?usp=drivesdk

Good luck

[Danny Mitchell]

Oops! I've just noticed, you'll have to request for access, no biggie, just a wee pfaphff

[Tony Russell Davis]

Hi Rich - just had to do a Facebook search to see which version of the Sierra keyless tuners you have; it's the same as mine with the brass hex nuts. Once you have fully slackened-off the tuner nut, push and hold the string puller back against the roller nut. You can use pliers to heave the string through the hole and round the clamping screw the same way as it tightens. Pull it very tight and try to have it cross over, or as near as possible crossed, and tighten down the screw. That should hold it fine. Then snip off the excess string. The high strings need most travel so really pull those.
Sierra recommend using a dowel rod with a hole in it to haul the strings. The string goes through the hole and wraps round the dowel. Here's the diagram, figures 17 and 18.
http://sierrasteels.com/support_documentation/sierramanual.pdf
And here's my tuners.

I guess that should cover it? Let me know if I can help further

[Richjevons]

Thanks everyone.
And thank you Tony for taking the time to do that, that is basically what I did for all of them but did come short on the top G # so maybe I need to pull harder.
I wondered if there was a better way as the brass hex screws seemed about twice the height as they were before I restrung it.

[Tony Russell Davis]

Rich, don't worry about the brass nuts being high, it's when they're all the way down that you have big problems - because you've reached the end of the travel with nowhere to go.

[Richjevons]

Sorry Tony, that’s my poor typing ( English ) using my phone. I meant they were twice the height before I read strung it. They’re fairly low now but fine on all strings apart from the 3rd where there’s not enough travel.

[Tony Russell Davis]

Yeah, those are the problematic ones, look at mine - the first three are way down and the third is almost out of travel. They need a really good heave and to keep the tension until the screw is tight, one lapse and you run out of options