double A said:
Cagey said:
Loading up on springs improves the return to neutral as well, for those who set the bridge to float.
Had never heard this before. I typically run my trems with three springs. You're saying using four or five will make the "return to zero" more accurate? Interesting....
(Rubs chin).
Mr. Fender was also known as "The Frugal Engineer"
citation needed, and would never have installed 5 springs just for fun.
He needed a spring that could counterbalance approximately 120lbs of string pull, but had a long enough extension for the necessary operating range and a small enough diameter so it could fit in a shallow cavity. Tough order on the cheap, so why not use multiple small springs so their pull added up to the right amount? Not a new idea, just a practical one, which suited The Frugal Engineer just fine.
You could eliminate a couple/few springs if you simply stretched them farther to get the tension you need, but now you're operating closer to the plastic deformation range of the spring material, which is NFG. Early failure or reduced performance was easy to predict. After all, look how fast strings reach their plastic deformation point and don't return to their original state, resulting in lost tune. So, more springs is the better solution. Springs are cheap, we got room, let's do it. Wouldn't surprise me to learn he was buying surplus brake lining return springs by the pallet load from some big automotive supplier for pennies on the dollar.
As it works out, the force vs. extension curve of a helical spring is fairly linear. This was fine back in the days before Jimi Hendrix and eventually Eddie VanHalen, who thought nothing of driving that wang bar all the way to the pickguard or using it as a handle to swing the guitar around with like some sort of oddly-shaped electric mace. When the Strat was young, vibrato was a subtle thing, used judiciously by responsible jazz players who were too high on the devil's weed to wank and crank like some kind of gorilla on meth. Now we want bomb simulations. All because of Machine Gun.
[youtube]BRE3kjL3Yjg[/youtube]
Of course, all that wankin' and crankin' is a lotta work and not everybody could afford meth, so guys started pulling springs out to make it easier to behave as though they could. Springs had to be extended farther to do their counterbalancing duty, and got hyper-extended in use, and here we are crying about staying in tune. Just put the springs back and let the claw out a little bit. It's more better.
Although, one thing to consider is if you use older bridge designs like Leo first came up with, the wang bar itself is under-designed for the amount of tension needed to dive to submariner depths with all 5 springs involved. Too skinny. Wants to give in to the bend rather than perform its leveraging duty on the bridge. Also, it's mounting point will wear fast. Stripped screw threads, etc. That's why you'll notice on Floyds, Wilkinsons, Schallers, etc. that the bar is about twice the diameter.
ccasion14:
