Trem-Setter - has anyone used one?

You might be our guinea pig on this. I've be meaning to get one for my S500 to mitigate the floating trem waver that occurs when I pull strings. Let us know how it goes.

-Greg

Thanks for helping me discover this, I've been looking for something like this ever since I got my Ibanez

Have to say this looks tempting but even after reading all the docs i'm still not sure why it works, lol. Maybe worth a look after i earn some money this summer.
Wouldn't mind one of their Guitar Xtenders but they're pretty expensive compared to just drop tuning by ear live then going back again.

You might be our guinea pig on this.

Well, I got it today. And I installed it this evening on my PRS Santana SE. I've only played it a little, but I can say it definately does help prevent the bridge from pulling up when you bend strings. You can bend a string and the others stay in pitch.

You can adjust the amount of stabilization, the trade off is that the tighter you make it the more force you need on the tremolo arm when doing dives. So you have to find the balance that is right for you. The good news there is that adjusting the stiffness is just a matter of turning a thumb screw once the unit is properly set up.

I set mine up fairly stiff because I don't really use the tremelo much anyway.

Getting it set up though is a bit tricky. If you're squeemish about working on your guitar, better let a tech do it. You need to replace the claw that holds your tremelo springs, and you also need to drill a small hole in the back of the spring cavity. Also the initial adjustment is a little complicated but if you follow the instructions to the letter you'll be alright.

Also you may have to do some reshaping of the brass rod that hooks into the tremolo block, I had to so that the unit would sit low enough and not hit the cavity cover when I put it back on. That was a little tricky.

It would also be nice if they gave you the allen wrench you need to tighten the set screw. I had to go digging around to find the right size.

Before setting it up, I checked around the newsgroups to see what comments people had about it. A lot of people complained about there being a kind of detent click feel when moving the tremelo arm from the raised pitch position through the neutral position to the lowered pitch position. Others said that you only get that if it is set up improperly. That seems to be true from what I've seen. So if you install it and it feels like that, you need to set it up again.

The Trem Setter comes factory installed on certain Fender strat models, like the strat plus. But apparently from the posts I've read, it doesn't come set up. Which is the cause of a lot of the complaints I read. Also changing string guage will mean you have to set it up again.
Have to say this looks tempting but even after reading all the docs i'm still not sure why it works

I think it's hard to explain, once you see it in action when you move your tremolo arm from the raised position to the dropped position it makes sense. The closest thing I can compare it to is a shock absorber on a car.

Another thing, If you install it and hate it, it is definately reversible, just take it out, put your old claw back in, and everything can be back the way it was.

Oh, and if you have a copy of Dan Erlewine's book 'Guitar Player Repair Guide' there is a section devoted to the Trem Setter in there. I found that useful too.

There is also a definate improvement in tone caused by the reduction in tremolo flutter.

So my conclusion is, it isn't too expensive, I think Stew-Mac charges around $37.50 for it. So if you are comfortable installing it yourself, should take you around an hour, maybe two at the most to install it. and then if you don't like it, you can go back.

Now I'm going to go play some more.

ooooh! JUST what ive been looking for. This solves all my floydrose problems to date.