I own several old Gibson guitars , so I am only passively interested in, and mildly amused at, the flame war over the self-tuning GForce system included on new Les Paul guitars.
Jacob of The Unbrokenstring Crew said “The Internet is where nuance goes off to die.” Like most topics of discussion, the flame wars over the Gibson GForce system has devolved into a bipolar, binary love/hate relationship. Perhaps, someone actually thought about the situation, and decided that they would sell more guitars WITHOUT the GForce system installed. To that end, our local national guitar retailer has received some interesting tool in the mail.
These blocks of steel have nylon alignment pins that fit in the factory tuner holes used by the GForce system. The small holes are where the headstock will be drilled for manual tuners of various makes and models. The Klouson holes are in the wrong place, so we are only installing Grover tuners for now.
Here is the back of a Les Paul headstock with the GForce system removed. Except for the indentations in the wood where the printed circuit board traces were, you would never know that they were there… more or less…
The GForce tuner assemblies were removed from the headstock. These are to be returned to the Global Headquarters of the National Guitar Retail Chain when we are through.
Perhaps they will salvage the rechargeable batteries, or maybe they will be used for spares as these fail in the future on other guitars. Hey, it could happen!
The nylon alignment pins hold the template in place. Drilling a hole and installing new manual tuners is straight-forward.
Grover tuners, anyone?
How about some locking Grover tuners?
For the purists, here are some Klusons on an older guitar.
I will not weigh in on the flame war over the deployment of the GForce system. But now you can go to a retail outlet and find a 2015 Les Paul that does not have the GForce system installed. We’ll see how this decision plays out over the coming years.
Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom!
Contact – David Latchaw EE
Cell – 281-636-8626