Improving tuners on my bronco?

[Ronbeast]

Hello everyone,

I figured I'd start a new thread because I couldn't find any info on my particular question.

So, a few days ago, my girlfriend bought me a squier bronco. I had been looking into getting a bronco for a while because I really like the old musicmasters and when the chance to get one came up, I snagged one.

I picked between a few different bronco's and picked the best of the bunch. The only problems I have are the fret edges are sharp (Could be fret sprout, though I doubt it) , but that isn't a huge deal.

The other problem is the tuners. They function well enough to keep the bass in tune, but that's about all they do. I'd like to try and improve upon them, but I don't want to modify the bass. It was a gift, and honestly, I love everything about the bass.

Problems I'm having with the tuners seem to be the fact that they don't always turn smoothly. The E string tuner is stiff, while the other tuners are all adjustable to varying degrees.

Would lubrication of the gears help the stiff E tuner at all? Anybody have any other recommendations? Should I just live with it?

[Ronbeast]

Bump. Does anyone have any tips? I'm sure I'm not the only one who has tried to improve a cheap set of tuners.

[Mickey Mao]

Are the tuners open tuners or sealed tuners? If they are open tuners, it's pretty straightforward to take them apart and make sure there's no dirt gumming up the mechanism. Also, the sheet metal spring can be adjusted for more or less force on the gear, which will change the stiffness.

I don't think lubrication should be necessary---I've never had to lube the tuners on any of my basses.

[Pilgrim]

I have a Bronco as well, but it's at home...if you can access the mechanism, add a bit of graphite as a lubricant. It's not oily and won't attract dust.

I've found the Bronco tuners to work just fine. I always tune UP to pitch, not down - that's a reliable way to make sure tuners don't creep.

[Ronbeast]

I do the whole tuning up to pitch as a good practice anyway, but the graphite idea sounds pretty good.

The tuners are sealed, but I shoulld be able to remove the outer casing if I take all of the screws out.

These are really underrated basses, I'm already considering my second