Yeah, the tuners on the Dot are your standard gibson grovers. I bend the hell out of my strings and have had no complaints.
As for those Sheratons, they're great. As are the Casinos, and the Regents. The only hollowbody or semi hollow Epi I had a beef with were the Joe Pass Emperors. Some of them were great, and some of them were not so great. The neck profile from guitar to guitar was totally different depending on where it was made, and the pickups were all over the place in terms of sound.
On a side note, I tried out the Ibanez AG95 and thought it was a hell of a guitar. It was more than I wanted to spend to just play two songs in a set, though. Although I may buy one yet. The appointments were all amazing, and the pickups were better than those on the Dot. The neck is a little weird as Ibanez being Ibanez tried to make it into a relatively small, fast playing neck, yet also tried to retain a c-profile like a traditional hollowbody. The result is the string spacing is awfully close, and the neck is a little awkward for thumb placement until you get used to it.