Help on setting up and maintaining floyd rose guitar?

Henry said:
Calling @Andy Eagle ... Recently watched this YT movie, and I thought it was snake oil. Any value to his setup "secret"?



Thanks!
Click to expand...

I could have written a book on this.
First up Carl is a super nice guy and a great player.
Now this video;
It starts by making some fundamental assumptions that are just plain wrong and fixes some issues in ways that are not acknowledged or even understood.
First assumption is that differential spring tension is translatable through the block of a six screw trem. The next one is that you can alter the differential pitch shift of individual strings with this differential tension . Both are nonsense.
The part that has a slight basis in truth is that a massively offset spring tension would be detrimental to tuning stability but unless you only put one heavy spring on one side is almost unachievable with standard parts. The string tension alone is capable of holding the trem in its proper place with only one spring in any of the five positions.
Equilibrium is just that and the spring claw should be straight. Carl doesn't mention for his assumptions to be correct the spring would need to be identical in spring character and totally linear .Then if the position of applied tension translated through the block the position of the tremolo arm would be a huge problem. Now we need to add that the string tension is not uniformly heavier in the thicker strings and the moment you depress the trem arm the tension distribution changes drastically with the thick strings loosing their tension first and faster than the others.
As you can see all this makes the angled claw for tuning stability nonsense.

Now the pitch;

On a strat with a standard set of string 9~42 10~46 etc if you have the action set up for a vintage-ish radius intonated you get close by coincidence to a semitone (high E) tone (B) three semitone (G) if you set the equilibrium to three semitones up pull before you hit the body on the G the others come in close. NOTHING you do to the claw will change these differential intervals . You can alter them by either changing the string gauge ,the action or the intonation. The last two work by altering the distance between the witness point on the saddle and the fulcrum of the trem and the first by altering the mass . The ONLY trem that has a provision to alter the travel of INDIVIDUAL strings independently from the action/intonation is the three incarnations of the Steinberger Transtrem.
Carl hits it by luck and attributes it to something that is utterly irrelevant .
And I never said BS once "oh f%$£.
 
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Andy Eagle said:
I could have written a book on this.
First up Carl is a super nice guy and a great player.
Now this video;
It starts by making some fundamental assumptions that are just plain wrong and fixes some issues in ways that are not acknowledged or even understood.
First assumption is that differential spring tension is translatable through the block of a six screw trem. The next one is that you can alter the differential pitch shift of individual strings with this differential tension . Both are nonsense.
The part that has a slight basis in truth is that a massively offset spring tension would be detrimental to tuning stability but unless you only put one heavy spring on one side is almost unachievable with standard parts. The string tension alone is capable of holding the trem in its proper place with only one spring in any of the five positions.
Equilibrium is just that and the spring claw should be straight. Carl doesn't mention for his assumptions to be correct the spring would need to be identical in spring character and totally linear .Then if the position of applied tension translated through the block the position of the tremolo arm would be a huge problem. Now we need to add that the string tension is not uniformly heavier in the thicker strings and the moment you depress the trem arm the tension distribution changes drastically with the thick strings loosing their tension first and faster than the others.
As you can see all this makes the angled claw for tuning stability nonsense.

Now the pitch;

On a strat with a standard set of string 9~42 10~46 etc if you have the action set up for a vintage-ish radius intonated you get close by coincidence too a semitone (high E) tone (B) three semitone (G) if you set the equilibrium to three semitones up pull before you hit the body on the G the others com in close. NOTHING you do to the claw will change these differential intervals . You can alter them by either changing the string gauge ,the action or the intonation. The last two work by altering the distance between the witness point on the saddle and the fulcrum of the trem and the first by altering the mass . The ONLY trem that has a provision to alter the travel of INDIVIDUAL strings independently from the action/intonation is the three incarnations of the Steinberger Transtrem.
Carl hits it by luck and attributes it to something that is utterly irrelevant .
And I never said BS once "oh f%$£.
Click to expand...

"That's all well and good buddy, but I saw this video on YouTube and it said.................."

Superb analysis, as usual 👌
 
Andy Eagle said:
The ONLY trem that has a provision to alter the travel of INDIVIDUAL strings independently from the action/intonation is the three incarnations of the Steinberger Transtrem.
Click to expand...

There is one very little known trem based on the same idea of in tune bending, called the RTO tremolo. I talked to the inventor a few years ago; very nice guy, and he was so specific about the trem that he would only install and set up the trem himself.
 
If I remember correctly, RTO stands for relative tuning offset. It’s an enormous chunk of hardware, like an even more huge and all brass Washburn Wonderbar. I really wonder about the tone.
 
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