Myka Guitars Posted January 11, 2005 Report Share Posted January 11, 2005 I found a local machinist who solved teh problem of puttign a trem on a carved top electric without modification. The tremolo mounts using the existing stop tail bushings. I recently visited Eric Stets and played a few guitars equipped with the trem. These are without a doubt one of the coolest trems on the market. Since it is surface mounted you do not lose sustain or tone at all. It is just like a fixed bridge. You also don't get that tremolo reverb thing going on and you don't have to route away all that wood and lose even more good tone. The other benefit is tha you can set your hand on the bridge for muting and it will not move on you. Pretty awesome. Check out the website: http://www.stetsbar.com After working with Eric on a mdification project I decided to build a guitar with this tremolo system. It will be pretty sweet! ~David Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aeli Posted January 11, 2005 Report Share Posted January 11, 2005 Very nice, looks like it would last a lifetime. A little pricey though, some models, aren't they? Well if we consider them being so unique and all, it is not abnormal actually... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cc2003btw Posted January 11, 2005 Report Share Posted January 11, 2005 Have seen these, excellent bit of kit, especially if you dont want to carve wood out of your prized home built guitar or gibson. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meegs666 Posted January 11, 2005 Report Share Posted January 11, 2005 to tell you the truth if i had a les paul i would rather have a stets bar than a bigsby. i like the idea a lot. its even good for 335's and the such. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevan Posted January 11, 2005 Report Share Posted January 11, 2005 Since it is surface mounted you do not lose sustain or tone at all. It is just like a fixed bridge. You also don't get that tremolo reverb thing going on and you don't have to route away all that wood and lose even more good tone. The other benefit is tha you can set your hand on the bridge for muting and it will not move on you. Pretty awesome. ~David Sorry man, but if there are springs anywhere in the equasion, you will lose sustain. I saw this unit years ago. I'm not hot on how the bar attaches to the unit, but otherwise it looks pretty cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LukeR Posted January 12, 2005 Report Share Posted January 12, 2005 Hi, I have just started making my guitar- it is a Les Paul, and it has been designed around using a stetsbar. I have only heard great things about them so far. Kevan, could you please tell me how much sustain is lost? I mean, is the efffect as per anoth other tremolo equipt guitar (with strat-type spring set up) or should I expect something major? Thanks, Luke Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevan Posted January 12, 2005 Report Share Posted January 12, 2005 Luke- Expect a "noticable" sustain loss, similar to the loss when switching between a Tele and a trem-equipped Strat. Springs are natural sustain suckers. It's inherent in their design. The Stetsbar is a cool design, esp. for those that want trem function but don't want to jack up their nice LP. There are, however, other trem designs that will work on LP's- Wonderbar (tough to find, but they're out there), and the Kahler 2300 and 2400 series trems (again, they're out there). The Wonderbar is a flat-mount system, so it involves simple drilling into the top of the body. The Kahler systems involve some drilling and routing in the top only. I am NOT saying that any of these units are bad. I'm saying that springs eat sustain. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guitarfrenzy Posted January 12, 2005 Report Share Posted January 12, 2005 I don't want to sound all negative and stuff and I'm sorry, but I don't even think they look good. It may work great, but just doesn't do anything for me. To each his own though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myka Guitars Posted January 13, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 13, 2005 I understand about springs sucking tone. This is true for the standard tremolo designs on the market, I agree. But with regards to the Stetsbar you do not take into consideration the nature of the springs used in the design. The density of the material plays a role here as well as the size of the spring, the spring coil diameter, the wire diameter, the stiffness of the wire, how it is attached to the tremolo, etc. It is not as simple as you are making it sound. The statement that all springs suck tone is so generic. To say this suggests that all springs resonate in the same way. It would be like saying that ebony and spruce resonante the same way. This simply is not true. Adjust this picture to account for the size and shape of the springs and it is even more apparent that this cannot be true. Most tremolos use 2 or 3 rather large, lightweight springs to do the work of opposing the tension of the strings. These springs (compared to a Stetsbar) are of lower density, have a larger diameter and longer length, are much less stiff, and the wire diameter is smaller. They will dissipate the string's vibrational energy rather easily and will resonate at lower frequencies due to these dimensions. They resonante freely in the guitar's range. The Stetsbar however uses 2 small thick springs that are quite dense. They take a lot more energy to get them to vibrate and dissipate string energy. The result is a spring that does not resonate (in the range of a guitar) with the rest of the system like a standard tremolo spring will. These springs resonate much like the rest of the metal parts of the bridge. Since you did play a guitar eqipped with a Stetsbar you must have noticed the obvious lack of 'tremolo spring reverb' that is very present with most trmeolo systems out there. Why? For one the Stetsbar springs do not resonate in the guitar's frequency range. We have barely even touched on the rest of the of the tremolo design and how this effects tone. All of the other tremolo systems mentioned in this thread use the springs as a main coupler to the body of the guitar. The Stetsbar is the only tremolo that couples the strings to the body before the springs. This design element alone renders the springs effect much more insignificant. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myka Guitars Posted January 23, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 23, 2005 I thought so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dugz Ink Posted January 23, 2005 Report Share Posted January 23, 2005 Please tell me if I'm wrong, but... The way this system looks to me is that you have an anchor, with springs and a lever connecting the anchor to a sliding tailpiece. If that's accurate, then.... I've read numerous articles that talk about applying pressure to the bridge/tailpiece to increase sustain. This rig looks like it applies some down-force to the bridge, but the tailstop just floats... basically suspended between strings and springs. So my newbie-mind is wondering how that could be a good thing. D~s Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myka Guitars Posted January 24, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 24, 2005 There is not any part of this system that floats. It was designed to eliminate this problem. The tune-o-matic section and the tailpiece section are secured to the same piece of metal that slides over the baseplate. Beacause of the string angle at the bridge there is considerable downward pressure on the front of the assembly. The springs are also angled so that they pull the back of the assembly down. This really allows the energy transfer to be consistent throughout the entire range of movement. That coupled with the heavy springs (that do not resonate within the guitars range) makes for a very solid system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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