The Steel Guitar Forum

For a number of years I have been intrigued by the advances in electronic tuners. And one of these has really caught my fancy. I have just gotten off the phone with Jim Campbell who builds one that I perceive to be the "catsbeejaybus" of all tuners.

It electronically couples the accuracy and visual aspects of the Conn strobe tuner with the many advanced features over a mechanical strobe unit.

In lengthy conversation with Jim (a very nice gentleman), I feel it just may be "THE" tuner for the PSG. Sadly, they are NOT inexpensive. 375 dollars for the PST-2* (Precision Strobe Tuner) and I don't have the price for his latest PST-3 as yet.

Can you imagine a design accuracy of .01 cents and an absolute accuracy of .1 cent? With the ability to store two different "offset" memories; that allow shifts from "straight" up tuning, ie, ET (ref A=440). For tuning 'dem beats out, or good ole boy tuning we call JI.

This means one could set up one memory for Jeff Newman's tuning. And set up the other one for that "crabby" keyboard player that says, "you outa tune, you hillbilly you!"

Or, any two memories setups shifted from ET; in any way you want them. And the accuracy still holds at .1 cent absolute.

The unit has a revolving (LED) strobe and as you get closer and closer to "in tune", the strobe slows down. When your guitar string is matched precisely to the tuner's memory (ET or shifted JI), the strobe LEDS (upper and lower set) stand perfectly still. If you are slightly flat, the LED's start slowly moving counter clock-wise; and clockwise if you are sharp.

Auto ranging (you do not have to dial in the octave or note), plus esthetics further emblish this awesome unit.

In reading on his website, I found the best description of tuning a musical instrument regards equal temperament; and just tuning I have ever read. He really makes it understandable for me at least. I commend him for it.

IF you are looking for a very high quality tuner and you want a fantastic featured one, do check out the PST-2 and 3. From all appearances and specs, this should prove to be one incredible aid in tuning our chosen istrument.

The link is:

http://www.izzy.net/~jc/PSTInfo/PSTInfo.html

carl

* The pictures on the website are temporarily down. Jim said he hoped to have them back up by the end of tomorrow. He is working on the website presently.<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by C Dixon on 25 January 2003 at 11:57 AM.]</p></FONT>

Carl,
I have said it before, and I'll say it again: highly accurate tuners have no place in the steel guitar world. The vagaries of materials used in the construction of the steel, the hysteresis, the cabinet drop, etc, render a strobe tuner useless. An inexpensive tuner is more than adequate.

Richard,

Very respectfully we will agree to totally disagree,

carl

Carl, I have Seiko 777 it has a dial with a needle and also shows in cents the number + or - from 0. It cost around $75.00 a little larger than a Cassett Tape.
Larry

Elderly catalog has the Sabine A X 2000 for $48 00 It is electronic , works real good for me, . has a sticky pad on the back sticks to your instruments

Lots O Luck

R. L.

Elderly catalog has the Sabine A X 2000 for $48 00 It is electronic , works real good for me, . has a sticky pad on the back sticks to your instruments

Lots O Luck

R. L.

I own a tuner that cost 69 dollars from Emmons about 10 yrs ago. It is good. I am also familiar with the tuners listed so far.

But none of these can come close to what the PST-2/3 does. Most all tuners (save the Conn) are higly inaccurate; respect to time on, temp, humidity, extraneous fields, etc. Also many are inaccurate between notes. IE, one note can be dead on and others be as much as several cents off. EVEN after calibration. Mine is one that suffers from this anamoly.

In addition, few cheapies can be progammed for offsets that are almost an absolute must on a PSG since 95% of us tune JI; or somewhere between JI and ET.

This is why I feel that MOST players only use a tuner for one note reference such as the E note; then tune everything else by ear. This is sad indeed and NO need for it.

IF, one has a faster and "dead on" way of bringing THEIR guitar into perfect tune with what they want it to be, why in heaven's name not use it. The PST2 would be such a tuner. Once one got their guitar in "perfect tune" (to their ears), they could program this into one of the offset memories in this tuner.

From this day forward they could tune "silently" every string, pedal and knee lever change; in just moments compared to any other method I know of. And every note would be dead-on to what they had previously programmed it.

If that player had an ocassion to play in a band that played somewhat sharp or flat of what their steel was normally tuned to, the PST can be shifted to whatever reference note they give you, and then each string can quckly be changed to that reference. And the same amount of JI shift (or ET shift if you tune that way) would be dead on. Etc. etc.

Being able to tune any string silently and instantly during a gig is just too much to not be using a high quality tuner, especially if one has a tuner that is guaranteed to be accurate to within .1 cent!!! And possibly down to .01 cents!

Referencing one note (as many do) then tuning all the rest by ear, or relying on inaccurate cheap tuners, is tantamount (IMO) to a pilot using VFR* flying a Boeng 767.

But as always, whatever floats yer......

God bless you all,

carl

* VFR = Visual Flight rules as oppossed to IFR = Instrument Flight rules.

Carl, it sounds like a great product. The one question I have is if you can put it between your guitar and pedal (so you can tune silently) without distorting the signal.

Everyone in my band uses an in line tuner. I have a Korg-TU12H velcroed on the back of my guitar. The guitar players have rack mounted tuners. We check our tuners once a month against each others for accuracy and have never had a problem in four years. I play right next to the lead player and if either one of us hears dissonance we go right to our tuners between the next song. Its usually the first part of the first set when we do most adjusting, but when we have the full lights set up and if there are fans operating we have to check our tuners a little more often. We get a maximum of fifteen seconds between songs. There is no dead air in our sets. I couldn't imaging trying to keep the guitar in tune for an hour's set without the in line tuner. Especially the outdoor gigs. We are not allowed to audibly tune on stage.

The Peterson 490 tuners can be bought for about $400 street price, and can store multiple temperments (I have 5 stored in mine, I think it will take a bunch more). If you get the 490ST "stretch" model, you can even program the offsets for a given note (F# anyone?)to different values in different octaves. Like stretch tuning a piano.

If Peterson would add non-volatile (remembers the settings when you turn it off) memory to the VS-1, that would be similar to the PST-3 shown on that website, and the VS-1 is selling for $200 street price.

I think tuning with a programmable strobe is a big improvement for steel. You can set up your temperment to account for cabinet drop, and get all the changes tuned dead on (the strobe is accurate to 0.1 cent) and then any out of tune is the operator!

With a cheap tuner, you can get into a "cat chasing its own tail", with the tuner inaccuracy, the PSG drops, and operator error swirling into a big mess. With a strobe, you eliminate 2 of the variables. I know I started sounding way more in tune after starting to use the strobe.

Are you gonna play that thing or just tune it?


------------------
<small>Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2000 Fessenden S-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro

I have the Peterson auto-strobe they are like Scott says they are, For sure. Glad you shared that Carl.

Gary Steele

Dave,

I do not know whether you can go in line with it or not. But I imagine it can be done. Incidently, I have never liked this idea. I have installed a single pole double throw switch on my guitars which allows me to instantly switch the output of the guitar from amp to tuner and vice versa.

On Emmons PSG's there is ample room on the PU switch plate for this switch. On my Excel I am going to do this with one added convenience;

I am going to mount a couple of small lamps in the right end cut out where the nylon tuners are located. Whenever I throw the toggle switch from amp to tuner, it also lites up that area in and around the tuners. Be suprised how helpful this is in dark places, trying to get your tuning wrench on the nylon tuners.

Note: in this case I will use a double pole double throw switch and the second set of contacts, control the lamps. Power for the lamps is a very small 12V* power supply from Radio Shack. An approproate sized jack is installed under the guitar for the power plug. On my guitar there was a perfect sized hole in a piece of aluminum extrusion just inside the bottom of the right end plate for this jack. Praise Jesus.

Larry, it would be nice if PSG players had the luxury of piano players. IE, they sit down and play it. NEVER seen a PSG player in my life do that! In fact; at most steel conventions, there is often a tuning room, so the players can sit for hours (in some cases ) tuning their cadmium plated tinker toys.

Gary, you are welcome.

God bless you all,

carl

* Make sure you use a DC power supply. You don't want AC to come anywhere near a PU on an electrified musical instrument. Else you will fight hum (buzz) forever.<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by C Dixon on 28 January 2003 at 08:42 AM.]</p></FONT>