If you like building or upgrading guitars, you may have already learned the valuable lesson that the devil absolutely is in the detail when it comes to to replacement parts. Maybe you became aware that there are two types of Telecaster bridges right after you drilled the holes through the body and noticed things just didn’t quite fit. Or maybe you liked the looks of those vintage locking tuners and the vibe you associate with them, only to realize later that the “vintage” part also refers to the headstock, and the holes in your modern one are too big.

The latter case recently happened to [Michael Könings], so he did what everyone with a 3D printer would: make an adapter. Sure, you can also buy them, but where’s the fun in that? Plus, the solution is as simple as it sounds. [Michael] modelled an adaptor to bridge the gap between the headstock holes and the tuner shaft, but unlike the commercial counterpart that are mounted only on one side, his fills up the entire hole and fits the entire construct tightly together. For even more overall stability, he added an interlocking mechanism on the back side that keeps all the adaptors in line, and also allows for some possible distance differences.

[Michael] initially considered using wood filament for cosmetic reasons, but due to lack of the material went with simple white PLA instead. In the end, it doesn’t matter too much, as most of it hides under the new tuners’ metal covers anyway — and the small parts that are visible will serve as a great reminder of this lesson in guitar variety. Speaking of 3D printing and guitar variety, now that we reached the headstock, and have seen bodies for a while already (including bass), only 3D-printed guitar necks are missing. Well, we’ve had them on violins though, even with 6 strings, but they also don’t have to deal with frets and have a bit less tension going on.