Keeping a Stratocaster In Tune

Corvus

I made a stainless shim to sit under my 6-screw Hipshot, very stable with heavy hauling on the trem and feels totally smooth. Bone nut, flared slots, lube. Bridge screws set with enough room. And bridge & screws in good nick - very clean surfaces & edges, no burrs, pitting or shitty plating (all stainless). So you can't deck it and have the strings go completely loose then have it back in tune like a Floyd, but it takes a good lot of stick. My 2-post Strat only needs the nut lubing fairly regularly. Very easy to live with.

jaymenon

p90fool said:

jaymenon said:

Personally, I'm happy to tune my guitars once a week or so, but I don't like to keep tuning constantly

You must be a very busy man. Would twice a week be do-able, say Wednesday lunchtimes and Sunday mornings?
 

Some people have the gift of tongue-in-cheek humour.

Nice one P90... :-)

And you're right - Andy's a lovely bloke. I just bought a guitar from him...

rossi

I bought a Burst  Squier Affinity  for 40 quid  in a terrible state of set up which sounded terrible but will not go out of tune despite my best efforts .I decided to keep it and put better pickups in and quick fret level to smooth it all out .Sweet  guitar now .Made me fancy a "real " Strat again.Its the only Strat I have owned which stays in tune perfectly  apart from my JV years ago .

jaymenon

Here'a a thought - in the early 90s Fender came out with their mini-Floyd bridge.

What if we were to use locking saddles with a conventional strat tremolo.

The tremolo would then function a bit like a non fine tuner Floyd Rose right? But wouldn't require any major modifications to the guitar...

I found these - not very pretty - but sure look interesting.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/STRING-LOCKS-upgrade-to-locking-saddles-for-Strat-style-tremolo-tailpieces/162597475240?ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2649

[Imgur](https://i.imgur.com/sarmo3T.jpg)
[Imgur](https://i.imgur.com/GbwlDSD.jpg)
[Imgur](https://i.imgur.com/N4PrUGW.jpg)

boogieman

I built a partscaster that has a Wilkinson VS100 and it’s rock solid, never ever goes out of tune even with completely decking the trem. It has Wilkinson EZ lock tuners fitted, so nothing special, but also has a Fender roller nut, which I think makes the most difference. It’s not a drop in job, the neck needs modifying to fit the nut (our very own WezV did the work for me, I’m a clumsy klutz with woodwork). 

ICBM

jaymenon said:

It's probably a good idea to set the intonation *before* locking the strings...

Danny1969

I have a Superstrat with Martin Sims neck, Fender roller nut and this Wilkinson trem .... the tuning is rock solid even with new strings 



I use a small amount of oil on all moving parts and silicon spray in the nut

DLM

In about 2003 I went to see Thomas Blug in a clinic at a Berlin store. He played his pre-CBS Strat, whammy moves and bends all over the place and didn't tune once throughout the set. Six-screw bridge (with only five of the screws in). All he would say is that there were many things one could do to keep the original system in tune.

jaymenon

Actually I don’t think those locking saddles will make enough of a difference -  while the strings are certainly locked in the saddles, the saddles are not locked down to the baseplate (like with Floyd, or indeed a Wilkinson).

 Played at a very high volume everything tends to sound in tune (unless you’re badly ‘out’), so making a judgement at a live gig is perhaps fundamentally flawed.

 Short of a double locking system, the Charvel Guthrie Govan is probable the most tuning stable system.

Danny1969

What does Jeff Beck use ? cos he hammers the shit out of his trem 

stonevibe

Danny1969 said:

What does Jeff Beck use ? cos he hammers the shit out of his trem 

He has a very good guitar tech 

boogieman

stonevibe said:

Danny1969 said:

What does Jeff Beck use ? cos he hammers the shit out of his trem 

He has a very good guitar tech 

This. He uses the standard Fender two point trem AFAIK, together with a roller nut. 

545454

I recommended this on another thread recently - this guy has quite a straightforward method for setting up conventional strat trems - this video is for 2 point, but he has a companion one for 6 screw bridges. I've used the method on both types (even cheapy import bridges) and it works really well, even for quite heavy trem use. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7luUzgDwwcs

jaymenon

I think I may have finally cracked the challenge of keeping a Stratocaster with a Vintage Tremolo in tune (at least to a discerning ear, if not to an electronic strobe tuner).

(A challenge for me anyway, plenty of guitarists have used the Strat effectively over the course of their glittering careers, but I have always found it difficult to keep in tune)

Smooth well lubricated nut slots, well installed strings etc are of course a given. I also use a bucket handle type of string tree, which moves with the string - so no friction (link below)

Previously - the Frudua Way:
I was previously tuning my Strat in such a way that every time I depressed and released the tremolo arm it would be in tune - I could do dive bombs and the stability was very impressive.  But whenever I bent a string, it would come back flat. That required a quick press of the arm, to bring the strings back in tune. In the middle of playing a solo, that is of course a real inconvenience...

So I did things the other way round:
Tuned each string after bending it such that, after a bend, the string is in tune.  Now I can play ‘bendy’ solos with impunity, and the guitar remains in tune.

I can now use the arm to add gentle vibrato to a note or chord - and it stays in tune.  But if I depress the trem arm significantly, the strings come back sharp. An upward pull on the arm brings them back in tune again.

That obviously requires enough 'amplitude' to the upward pull, and so I set up the trem with some clearance to give me a good range of upward movement - 3 semitones on the G string.  This automatically yields 2 semitones on the B string and 1 semitone on the E string, due to the very nature of the strings (which is of course why the G string requires less turning of the tuning post for more pitch change).  The upward range is like the Carl Verhayen method - but whilst he is a great guitarist, I'm not convinced by the physics involved in his explanation.  Angling the claw makes no difference at all - the trem block is rigid and does not angle.  Also the low strings do not exert any more tension than the high ones - evidenced by the published tensions on the back of a pack of D’Addario strings.

The only caveat is that I can't really 'dive bomb' - but I don’t do that anyway.

Thought you may find the stuff below interesting...

My Strat has a rather nice Wudtone tremolo. The Wudtone Trem addresses many of the design shortcomings of the conventional six screw tremolo. Not as rock solid as a Floyd but I do like it...
http://www.wudtone.com/wudtone-hardware/

Sounds beautiful. The nut slots are cut perfectly, everything is lubricated and I have a bucket handle type of string tree, which you may find interesting.
http://www.dynaguide.nl/uncategorized/the-string-guide-that-loves-friction/

http://www.strat-talk.com/wp-strat/2014/10/dynaguide-string-tree-keeps-you-in-tune/

normula1

I have the VS100 and a Wudtone CP and both stay in tune very well with locking tuners etc. My '85 Squier with original bridge and non-locking tuners is almost as good.
On my '98 Japanese '62 reissue the grinding on the underside of the bridge plate is terrible and it makes the whammy pretty much useless.

57Deluxe

Stand it in the corner of the room and don't play it... works for me...

Nunogilberto

I find the best way is to gently place the guitar on a stand and go and get a Tele instead

dazzajl

A bit confused by this thread. My Strat is, in all fairness a complete POS, it’s setup is nothing more than my tinkering, I’m definitely not a finesse player and it stays in tune perfectly. 

Voxman

545454 said:9

I recommended this on another thread recently - this guy has quite a straightforward method for setting up conventional strat trems - this video is for 2 point, but he has a companion one for 6 screw bridges. I've used the method on both types (even cheapy import bridges) and it works really well, even for quite heavy trem use. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7luUzgDwwcs

I used this set up on my 2010 2-point Strat a couple of years back and posted that vid here, and it works superbly. Used the 6 screw vid version on my Pacifica 611vfm and ditto. Both now hold tuning really well after whammy use. 

thegummy

Never really know what exactly people mean when they say a guitar doesn't having tuning problems or that it "stays in tune".

Do they mean they can tune a guitar, play it properly for hours and at the end the strings are all exactly still in tune?

That weeks/months later the guitar still doesn't need its tuning adjusted at all?

I didn't think that was possible for a guitar (maybe on a locking system, no idea about them).