floating bridge

[Charvel]

How many of you guys find floating bridges a pain in the ass to tune, man it took me ten minutes to get it perfectly down half a step cause you loosen the strings then theres not as much pull on the bridge so there you gotta tune again, who here finds that a pain in the ass?? i kno i do

 

[JammerMatt]

Re: floating bridge

Tremendous PIA. I can't even imagine beginning to down tune to Eb. I would just buy another guitar. The other day I noticed my Jackson's Floyd was a little out of kilter, tilted slightly up which caused the action to be low and buzzing. It took about 1/2 hour or more to loosen the springs, tune, loosen the springs, tune, loosen the springs, etc.

I would expect that to tune down to Eb, you will end up having to readjust the Floyd's springs until the bridge is level, readjust the truss rod since you're losing string tension and the neck will want to reverse curve, and maybe even adjust the bridge height due to adjusting the neck. I advise that you have at least two drinks handy to get you through the whole ordeal.

Or... buy another guitar for Eb.

I could be wrong, tho.

-Matt

 

[JammerMatt]

Re: floating bridge

Oops. You're only 13. I meant two Coca Cola's or Pepsi's. Not alcohol for you my young friend!

-Matt

 

[Charvel]

Re: floating bridge

Will it hurt my guitar if i down tune it and tune it back to standard once in a while??

 

[y2stevo]

Re: floating bridge

Yeh for someone who is experienced with setting up a floting floyd it would take him a good 2 hours to do it properly, so i think your definitly better off with a new guitar for different tuning, another option is that you block off the recess, you wouldn't be able to raise pitch but it would increase sustain and you wouldn't have to keep resetting the springs when tuning down..

 

[Charvel]

Re: floating bridge

ive tuned my guitar down 2 times since spring break... (when i bought it) and i never reset the springs.... could that cause a problem? cause all i did was like on a regular guitar you tune it down and play thats what i did... so is that bad?

 

[Charvel]

Re: floating bridge

so if i put it back to standard, and left it at that, from the down tunings i did would that still make that happen or would it be fine?

 

[JammerMatt]

Re: floating bridge

I agree totally with JohnJohn's procedure. When you said you did it in a half an hour, my head spun and I said, "naaah." But now that you mention that you didn't do any adjustments to the springs or the truss rod, I understand. Like JJ said, you could still play it that way (Eb), but your Floyd will be pointing up in the air slightly, and if your action was set real low to begin with you might experience some buzzing, and your intonation would be off to some degree.

If you go back to your standard E setup, your guitar should spring back fine, but then again Floyds can be touchy things. Also, going back and forth shouldn't hurt it at all as long as you go easy on the truss rod and only turn it an 1/8th to a 1/4 turn per day.

My Jackson is funny in that it needs an adjustment about twice a year, changes with the seasons and the humidity. I have to adjust the truss rod and the Floyd every 6 months or so.

Hope this helps.

 

[Charvel]

Re: floating bridge

My lower E- string is buzzin by doing what john john said would that fix it,?

 

[JammerMatt]

Re: floating bridge

Yeah, I think so. If you are downtuned to Eb, you have released string tension. I think you can either raise the bridge with the "claw" nuts, or you can try to add some relief to the neck by tightening the truss rod. I would go for raising the bridge since it's easier at this point.

-Matt