Ok, I just bought a new Jackson with a Floyd rose tremelo, mainly because I liked the way it sounded and the looks, but now I'm reading that Floyd Rose tremelos are a pain.
Can someone tell me what kind of troubles I'm looking at. From some of the posts I see it's best to not change all the strings at once.
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The only thing I know of is that changing strings involves a long process of looseing and screwing in things on your floyd rose tremelo. It's supposed to normally be a long process, much longer than changing a normal guitar's strings
Not having had any direct experience with them myself, I'm perhaps not the best person to comment, but here's my thoughts;
-Probably best to change one string at a time, but do them within a few days of eachother.
-Keep the mechanism (Especially all the moving parts) fairly well lubricated. General purpose oil stuff should do the trick, but not too much, otherwise you get a lot of gunk all over your guitar, which rather inhibits your playing. Also, maybe try some graphite from a pencil lead on the parts where string touches guitar (Nut and bridge) this allows the strings to glide over more easily.
-Eddie van Halen used to boil his strings, to ensure that they are totally streched before using them so that they didn't go out of tune as he abused the trem. Some say that this is bad for the strings, and to be honest it's probably not so good for them, but it does work.
I boil all my strings occasionally to clean them off, because I'm a student and can't afford new strings as regularly as I need them. I've never had a string go rusty on me yet...
To be honest, that advice is really true for any trem, not just a floyd rose, but its particularly relevant for floyd roses.
I hope that helps, and I hope you enjoy the new guitar. some day, when I have the money, i'll get my a guitar with a floyd.
Peter
If you take the time, it's not as big a deal as some people make it out to be. If you don't use it, then of course it's a useless pain in the booty, but if you do use it, then a small amount of care will keep things going spiffy.
Start off by taking it to a good tech to make sure it's all set up right. Believe me when I tell you that if you've never handled one before it will take a little while to get a feeling for the whole thing and how it works. If you start with a good setup - your bridge is level with the body, your intonation is spot on, etc, then at least you'll have a solid point of reference, you'll know what it's supposed to look and feel like when everything is right.
When you're changing the strings, yes, you should change them one at a time. You should do it all in one "session" per the usual way, but you should take each string off one at a time, and replace it, stretch it, tune it, then next string. Keep in mind that the trem is in part a balancing act, if you change gauge of strings, you will throw the balance off, and you'll need to set the bridge up again, in addition to the usual truss rod adjustment.
For those using the trem regularly, the floyd is arguably the best trem system to come along, but be aware of it in all aspects of maintenance, it does demand a higher level of knowledge and care.
Ibanez sites typically provide a good knowledge base for floyd rose knowledge, as that's where the floyders tend to gather: Head to Jemsite ( http://www.jemsite.com I think) and Rich's Ibanez Rules( http://www.ibanezrules.com ) for some good maintenance tips. Rich's site in particular contains some great pages about cleaning up and setting up a trem.
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Yes, it probably will take a bit longer to change strings and tune up. But, they are locking trems and generally can stay in tune much much longer. I had an Ibanez with a floyd and played a gig one night, got too busy the following week, went to next week gig and guitar was still spot on in-tune.
Plus the fine tuners help with minor adjustments.
So to answer your question, pain- yeah, a bit more than normal. But IMHO, definately worth it.
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