Ratio machine heads: a new standard for tuning

(Image credit: GraphTech)

Your beloved bass may have a flawlessly intonated bridge strung with a brand-new pack of the best, sturdiest strings on the market. Maybe you even just got a fire-breathing new amp, or a funky new pedal, that you’re absolutely dying to try out. If you have shoddy tuners though, you might as well toss all that other fancy gear down the toilet, because none of it will come close to compensating for being out of tune.

Now, ‘you won’t sound good if you don’t stay in tune’ isn’t exactly the world’s most controversial opinion, but staying in tune is often considerably more difficult than it sounds. 

Imagine, if you will, that you’re walking up or down a flight of stairs. Now picture doing that, but the stairs are all different sizes and are built at different distances from one another. 

Because each string on your bass has its own distinct core diameter, tension is inherently different for each one. Some strings are more sensitive, while others require quite a bit more twisting and turning to get properly in tune. When your strings are being particularly temperamental, tuning can really feel like walking down that uneven set of stairs. 

And that, my friends, is where GraphTech’s Ratio machine heads for bass come in. 

Ratio machine heads: re-defining your tuning experience

(Image credit: GraphTech)

Though each string is different, your typical set of machine heads features gears that are all the same size, almost as if you asked your whole family to all wear the same size shoe. Ratio machine heads though, take the core thickness of each string into account, and tailor the size of the gear in each tuner to be the perfect fit.

With Ratio machine heads, the size of the gear in each tuner is calibrated to the core diameter of the string being spun on it, balancing the response so that every string responds the same to tuning adjustment. A 360 degree turn of the button produces one tone of pitch change. A half turn changes the pitch by a semitone.

The consistency is unprecedented. The fine tuning capability is unsurpassed. 

A sleek, elegant and analog fix to your tuning issues, Ratio machine heads are the next step in the evolution of string revolution. 

GraphTech's Ratio machine heads for Bass are available for 4, 5 and 6 string basses of all alignments - 2+2, 4 inline, 2+3, 3+2 and 3+3. They come in two housing/button styles: a small, enclosed housing with a Y button, and a larger, open backed housing with classic Cloverleaf buttons. 

They are available now, in Chrome and Black finishes, from graphtech.com. Order yours now!

(Image credit: GraphTech)