nervous
Well-known member
Because I suck at successfully setting up floating tremolos I just gave up a long time ago and either avoid them altogether or set them to dive only ad then only use it for light wobble. I understand how they work and the problem areas for return tuning but just not anything I wanted to battle with anymore. However recent discussions and subsequent research around the Wilkinson WLS130 locking saddles piqued my interest and with a lot of folks very happy with them I thought I'd make that another winter pastime project. And today was the day to see how that went with my Silo Special.
These had the usual replacement saddle issues of not leaving a lot or room for intonation adjustments as they all have some saddles that sit very close to the bridge plate. They also require spring cutting and screw shortening, the latter of which I will tweak at a later date. The biggest issue that I had was with the low E saddle and how that rearward position ended up blocking the string through hole to the point where it was nearly guillotining the string, taking an odd path, and would make restringing difficult through such a small space. This all depended on where that saddle end up once intonated. I did make a valiant attempt at elongating that string cutout but didn't make great progress. I made some, likely enough, but not as much as I wanted to. The hardened steel material is indeed very hard and my small files didn't have much success. Thinking on alternative methods. But I may have had success in the end with just enough clearance. I'd like that back a bit more but it seems to be acceptably intonated so for now I will leave it, play it and see.
That said I do think that I may have ended up with an in tune floating trem though so that's fun. I have about 1/16" body to bridge clearance and I will have to research again if that I the goal. But I think the pull intervals sound good.
Some pics:
Installed:
The low E string through clearance
My bridge height:
These had the usual replacement saddle issues of not leaving a lot or room for intonation adjustments as they all have some saddles that sit very close to the bridge plate. They also require spring cutting and screw shortening, the latter of which I will tweak at a later date. The biggest issue that I had was with the low E saddle and how that rearward position ended up blocking the string through hole to the point where it was nearly guillotining the string, taking an odd path, and would make restringing difficult through such a small space. This all depended on where that saddle end up once intonated. I did make a valiant attempt at elongating that string cutout but didn't make great progress. I made some, likely enough, but not as much as I wanted to. The hardened steel material is indeed very hard and my small files didn't have much success. Thinking on alternative methods. But I may have had success in the end with just enough clearance. I'd like that back a bit more but it seems to be acceptably intonated so for now I will leave it, play it and see.
That said I do think that I may have ended up with an in tune floating trem though so that's fun. I have about 1/16" body to bridge clearance and I will have to research again if that I the goal. But I think the pull intervals sound good.
Some pics:
Installed:
The low E string through clearance
My bridge height:
