Adding a Floyd Rose...? (Charvel Content)

[SFW]

I have an early 2000s Charvel Journeyman. I love this guitar. It plays great, and sounds killer. Over the years, I have done some work to the guitar to attempt to use the trem and have it stay in tune. I have added Gotoh locking tuners, a new graphite nut and a Gotoh V100N trem. Despite all of this, the guitar will not hold tuning if I touch the bar. At the moment, I have screwed a wood block into the trem cavity, basically making the guitar a fixed bridge. I would really like to be able to use a wiggle stick on this guitar. I am contemplating having the trem studs filled and having it routed for an OFR. I would have to do a recessed FR routing to get the proper angle across the neck. While the guitar currently has a trem unit, I guess I'm a bit afraid that this will change the tone of the guitar. Has anyone had this done to a guitar? Did it severely thin out the tone? And lastly, if anyone in Houston or Austin could recommend a good tech to do the work, that would be super cool. I have a shop that does a lot of my work, but I don't quite trust them with this particular surgery...lol. Thanks for the input!

 

[GilmourD]

Re: Adding a Floyd Rose...? (Charvel Content)

I did that to this guitar. Of course, I made so many changes to it at once (stripped finish, repainted, installed Floyd, put on a different neck) that I'm not sure which part changed the tone. However, I love the way this thing sounds.

I'm actually thinking about doing the same thing to this guy, not because of tuning issues but just because I vastly prefer non-recessed Floyds.

If you don't want the Floyd to float you can shim the neck. It takes a small shim at the two screws closest to the bridge to change the angle of the neck enough for a Floyd to work. A good tech will be able to give you a non-recessed setup with no troubles.

 

[Rand-O-Monium]

Re: Adding a Floyd Rose...? (Charvel Content)

Do it!!!
:headbang:

 

[Pierre]

Re: Adding a Floyd Rose...? (Charvel Content)

Have a tech check out the nut and setup the guitar first. They should also look at the trem's knife edges.

There is no reason a well setup guitar with a straight-pull headstock shouldn't keep in tune with this vibrato. The fact that the nut is graphite won't help if it's poorly cut.
Also in my experience, locking tuners do not necessarily contribute to a better tuning stability vs. a properly strung guitar. They do make restringing a lot easier though