Tremolo and hardtail

Orpheo said:
Ryan (Rounce55) said:
Orpheo said:
I just got my kahler. its such a goddamn great unit. can't stop talking about it. its sleek, slender, looks great, and is HEAVY!!!! almost 500 grams. this baby will sustain for days!

But it won't fit on my guitar?

sure it will fit. you need to rout a bit though, as I've always told people, and kahler too. You've got your tremblock underneath the unit, and that needs space to pivot.

the stetsbar will take away 'some' sustain, and change the tone a bit, a bit more fuzzy, and the range is just not enough for a nice divebomb or pull up. at least, in my opinion. and: it does not have finetuners! aka; useless if you have a locking nut. absolutely useless. and: it doesnt stay as good in tune as one would hope for. and its bloody expensive!

the kahler is more stable, weighs more, more solid brass, thus, more mass for the string to vibrate. the string doesnt have that kind of energy, so the energy which the string transfers to those metal blocks gets reflected, resulting in more energy in the string, thus: more sustain. the string has the same transferpoints of energy as with a tune o matic; saddle and tailstop, and that goes to studs into the body. a 2200 has, imho, a better tone than the 2300 (studmount vs flatmount). the flatmount is made for a strattype guitar, with those same transferpoints, so it doesn't differ in sound as much, a 2200 is made for a tune o matic style guitar.

the routing is very easy, and if you have the kahler in place, you dont see it. If you want to get your normal ToM bridge, you can fill it with a piece of wood, regular black nailpolish from your girlfriend, and you dont see it, well, you will ofcourse, but it wont be a hole anymore. your axe is black, as far as I can see, so a good luthier can blend the finish in with the old, so you dont see it, but why would you want to change it? a kahler ROCKS. if you look on youtube, and you watch the vids 'floyd vs kahler', you might think, damn, the kahler stinks! but bare in mind, the player there, has a bias towards floyd rose tremolo's, thats obvious. the bending issue, is a nonissue. I've had and tried 5 kahlers, old and new, and none of them had the 'bending' issue. true, the range isn't as far as with the floyd. but: if you take the other trem arm, the shorter one, you have just as much, no,even more range, than with the floyd.

also, sustain. the kahler has MORE sustain than a floyd. had a floyd guitar, tried it out, retrofitted it with a kahler, and the kahler had 8 seconds more sustain...

also, the kahler has more ways of adjusting. radius, saddleheight, stringspacing... thats what you can adjust. with the floyd; try it, and go bazurk. you can't do it with a floyd.

the kahler is also less prone to failure. sure you see this stuff on the site of kahler, those 14 points. but setting up a floyd is HELL. its a floating unit, where the kahler is more easy to work with, cause it acts like a fixed bridge (regarding intonation and stuff). oh, intonation is also easier...

the trem arm is on a kahler on a better location. my hand always bumps in the tremarm when I play, on any other trem, cause its so close to the saddles. I bruised my hand once, cause I was doing heavy palm mutes on a floyd-guitar, and my hand bumped into the arm, cause I forgot it was a floyd-guitar... try that with a kahler! the tremarm sits more backwards, so your hand wont hit it!

also, you can adjust the tremarm tension and springtension of the block on TOP of the unit! you don't have to turn it over or take it apart to adjust it. just 1 allen wrench, twist and turn, and its tone. the tremarmadjustment works great. with a floyd, you've got that sleeve. if you swirl the arm around a couple of times, the arm will come loose a bit, and you have to readjust that sleeve. with a kahler, no such thing. if you want it to stay in one place, it will, over and over again.

with a stetsbar, you've got several options of the kahler, but nowhere near as much as on the kahler, in every aspect...

So how much routing are you talking about?
 
Ryan (Rounce55) said:
Orpheo said:
Ryan (Rounce55) said:
Orpheo said:
I just got my kahler. its such a goddamn great unit. can't stop talking about it. its sleek, slender, looks great, and is HEAVY!!!! almost 500 grams. this baby will sustain for days!

But it won't fit on my guitar?

sure it will fit. you need to rout a bit though, as I've always told people, and kahler too. You've got your tremblock underneath the unit, and that needs space to pivot.

the stetsbar will take away 'some' sustain, and change the tone a bit, a bit more fuzzy, and the range is just not enough for a nice divebomb or pull up. at least, in my opinion. and: it does not have finetuners! aka; useless if you have a locking nut. absolutely useless. and: it doesnt stay as good in tune as one would hope for. and its bloody expensive!

the kahler is more stable, weighs more, more solid brass, thus, more mass for the string to vibrate. the string doesnt have that kind of energy, so the energy which the string transfers to those metal blocks gets reflected, resulting in more energy in the string, thus: more sustain. the string has the same transferpoints of energy as with a tune o matic; saddle and tailstop, and that goes to studs into the body. a 2200 has, imho, a better tone than the 2300 (studmount vs flatmount). the flatmount is made for a strattype guitar, with those same transferpoints, so it doesn't differ in sound as much, a 2200 is made for a tune o matic style guitar.

the routing is very easy, and if you have the kahler in place, you dont see it. If you want to get your normal ToM bridge, you can fill it with a piece of wood, regular black nailpolish from your girlfriend, and you dont see it, well, you will ofcourse, but it wont be a hole anymore. your axe is black, as far as I can see, so a good luthier can blend the finish in with the old, so you dont see it, but why would you want to change it? a kahler ROCKS. if you look on youtube, and you watch the vids 'floyd vs kahler', you might think, damn, the kahler stinks! but bare in mind, the player there, has a bias towards floyd rose tremolo's, thats obvious. the bending issue, is a nonissue. I've had and tried 5 kahlers, old and new, and none of them had the 'bending' issue. true, the range isn't as far as with the floyd. but: if you take the other trem arm, the shorter one, you have just as much, no,even more range, than with the floyd.

also, sustain. the kahler has MORE sustain than a floyd. had a floyd guitar, tried it out, retrofitted it with a kahler, and the kahler had 8 seconds more sustain...

also, the kahler has more ways of adjusting. radius, saddleheight, stringspacing... thats what you can adjust. with the floyd; try it, and go bazurk. you can't do it with a floyd.

the kahler is also less prone to failure. sure you see this stuff on the site of kahler, those 14 points. but setting up a floyd is HELL. its a floating unit, where the kahler is more easy to work with, cause it acts like a fixed bridge (regarding intonation and stuff). oh, intonation is also easier...

the trem arm is on a kahler on a better location. my hand always bumps in the tremarm when I play, on any other trem, cause its so close to the saddles. I bruised my hand once, cause I was doing heavy palm mutes on a floyd-guitar, and my hand bumped into the arm, cause I forgot it was a floyd-guitar... try that with a kahler! the tremarm sits more backwards, so your hand wont hit it!

also, you can adjust the tremarm tension and springtension of the block on TOP of the unit! you don't have to turn it over or take it apart to adjust it. just 1 allen wrench, twist and turn, and its tone. the tremarmadjustment works great. with a floyd, you've got that sleeve. if you swirl the arm around a couple of times, the arm will come loose a bit, and you have to readjust that sleeve. with a kahler, no such thing. if you want it to stay in one place, it will, over and over again.

with a stetsbar, you've got several options of the kahler, but nowhere near as much as on the kahler, in every aspect...

So how much routing are you talking about?

4x4x2 centimeters. the routing is covered completely by the tremolo, and if you dont want the tremolo anymore, you can still put on your old tune o matic bridge and tailstop without a problem. there will be a cavity under the strings though. but as I said, you can fill that up with a piece of wood so you dont see it anymore.

I know that vid by the way. but do you really feel thats a lot of travel? well, I dont :) thats why I say: kahler all the way (besides, a kahler stays better in tune).
 
Hey Ryan, did you go for a whammy in the end, and which one? I'm kind of interested in both Kahlers and the Stetsbar so any feedback (besides Orpheo's gushing :icon_biggrin:) would be interesting.
 
Super Turbo Deluxe Custom said:
T.L. said:
There's a reason that Floyds are more popular than Kahlers...

I really don't have an opinion on which is better, but "more popular" doesn't necessarily mean better.  I'm just saying.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy1eiMZ5nUk
 
Well my parents aren't big on me spending money even if it's my own so I kinda have to wait til summer break officially starts don't ask why.
 
Also, a good guitar tech can route a body for a Floyd.  I've had this done locally, with a Warmoth body, with excellent results.
 
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