Excuse me for what will likely seem appalling ignorance in a guy who's been playing electric guitar for many years...........
I have guitars with trems fitted, but they've all arrived with the plate hard against the guitar, ie there is some scope for depressing the bar and flattening a note but none for raising the bar/sharpening a note. I've never been a trem user (in fact I don't normally even attach the levers to the guitars) so I've left them as is. But recently I had a notion of doing a bit of experimentation with the trem. So my questions are:
- how do I free up/adjust the trem so that I can use it properly
- would it need the guitar to be set up again?
- are there implications for tuning stability/sound from freeing up the trem even if you are not using it?
The guitars are Suhr (Gotoh 510s I believe) and a PRS DGT
“To a man with a hammer every problem looks like a nail.”
Comments
As above, plus springs with different weights/pulls are available.
With reduced tension the bridge is more likely to move with bent strings, which can be a pain if you hold down one or two strings and bend another. Also more tendency to wobble the bridge with the palm. But the degree of these all depends on string gauge & trem setup.
I'd reduce the spring tension first, starting with 1/8th of a turn on the bass-side trem screw, and re-tune. I'd only do 1/8th of a turn at a time, so it's easier to return to where you were.
Also I always adjust bass side first, then treble, mostly habit.
Once the trem is where you want it, and the guitar is in tune, enjoy. IMine all have floating bridges (admittedly 4 are Floyds), but once the strings are properly stretched in, and unless you have a massively heavy picking hand, then they should be stable.
Ringleader of the Cambridge cartel, pedal champ and king of the dirt boxes (down to 21)
you shove a shim under the bridge (a wedge of wood on a piece of paper to avoid scratching the surface) then tune the guitar again till the shim drops out and the guitar is in tune.
might need to drop the saddles a little after wards and the intonation might be a little off.
+1 What he ^ said. I would just loosen the springs with the strings under tension until the bridge rose 2-3 mm off the guitar top, then retune and fine tune if necessary.
Yes, I don't see why changing the balance of tension by loosening the springs would destroy the knife-edge, but doing the same by waggling the bar wouldn't..
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"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein