# Steve Vai's 'tool-less tremolo system' prototype



## Bloody_Inferno (May 24, 2016)

Turns out Vai's been developing a trem system that doesn't require an allen wrench. Hence 'tool-less'. Photos of a new Jem with the prototype unit. The nut's got a lever system, and a new bridge saddle design. 
































Interesting design overall, and in theory, it's good for practicality. Dunno if I can get used to the nut design though.


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## A-Branger (May 24, 2016)

yeah the nut is pretty big, maybe they would find a way to make it smaler?. The bridge seems to be a non locking one. And that you wont need to cut the end ball of the strings either. Under the fine tunners is a tunnel from where you feed the strings. Cool design tho


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## OmegaSlayer (May 24, 2016)

I'm all for innovation, but I really don't get the utility of this, as unlocking a locking tremolo on the fly requires a more than perfect set-up


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## CaptainD00M (May 24, 2016)

Kinda seems a bit late in the game for this too.


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## nerdywhale (May 24, 2016)

Didn't Yamaha have a similar "tool-less/clamping" nut and bridge concept once upon a time? I think it was on Wes Borland's old Yamaha sig model.


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## SnoozyWyrm (May 24, 2016)

Wasn't he developing another concept? I seem to recall a Premier Guitar article showing a horizontally moving (instead of 2-point pivoting) tremolo. Can't seem to find it now though.


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## MajorTom (May 24, 2016)

It's been done before and I'm pretty sure thousands of kids around the world have replaced the allen key bolts on the nut with the same style of ones used for the fine tuners on thd bridge, I know I did as a teenager. In fact the guitar I did it too is still like that to this day I'm sure, but this nothing new, kids have been doing this since the stone ages when I was twelve and desperate to put my weiner to good use.

This may be the first time that a guitar manufacturer has made it commercially available instead encouraging kids to do more with their brain cells than abuse them and introduce them to Leary and Chong.

Don't forget Floyd Rose had the 'quick string change' system that was unsuccessful and went down as well as Britney Spears, but it was still designed and for a short time available. 

So apologies for wetting every ones chips.


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## Sumsar (May 24, 2016)

Well I think it is always nice when someone tries to do thing in a more clever way. Floyd Rose has not really done much since they came up with the original design, while Ibanez has done a ton of different models, which all has some very nice ideas like ball-bearings, no-need-to-cut-ball-when-restringing-system, different-arm-inserts, smoother-surface, lo-pro-fine-tuners-out-of-the-way, weird-double-spring-system, easy-adjust-spring-tension, easy-trem-stop and now this maybe-better-or-at-least-easier-way-to-unlock-the-nut-system.

Ofc all of those inventions and systems has not all been perfect, but at least they are trying, which I for one really love.

I think if they could make it a little less bulky this could totally fly. Alternatively they could have the release system on the back of the neck/headstock, though that posses the problem of being in the way of your hand/fingers.


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## Pikka Bird (May 24, 2016)

I can't figure out what the deal is with that nut and the screws on two of the levers. And the trem itself looks like a regular non-locking dealio.

In any case, it looks rather odd, and I'd much rather have Bill Edwards' Finger-Tite nut, which works exactly like a modern bicycle skewer and even looks halfway sleek:




In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if you could convert a regular FR nut to the Edwards concept with a little zest.


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## GraemeH (May 24, 2016)

Looks like you could replicate the bridge entirely by "just" hollowing out through your string retainer block screws. If you could do that accurately enough.

The real low-hanging fruit of Floyd Rose derivative trem design for me though is the intonation adjustment method. The fact that they have to sell a separate tool to ease the process shows the design isn't right in the first place.


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## Pikka Bird (May 24, 2016)

^Those already exist. And for your second paragraph, I agree completely. I think Ibanez should bring their intonation tool and the off-center saddle lockdown screws back.


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## bostjan (May 24, 2016)

My  - I can get hex keys for $0.65 at the hardware store, and I'm not stingy about having one in each guitar case, one in my backpack, and even one in my wallet. The only time there is an issue is when some off brand trem manufacturer uses an oddball size screw or something.

So, what problem does this solve for me? Nothing, really. Do I want a bulky doodad on my guitar? Not really. Do I still think it's cool somebody is playing with this? I guess - I dunno, as others said, it's kind of late in the game for this. I think a lot of people are in my boat, that they already adjusted to using a hex key, or decided to use a different style of trem or no trem at all. Even seeing something like this ten years ago would have been too late.

I hope that if this system fails to get attention, Steve Vai will continue coming up with stuff - maybe something a bit more practical, though.

This reminds me a bit of the EVH D-Tuna. Cool concept, if you drop D on a non-floating OFR. Problem is, unless you get a vintage axe or an EVH sig guitar, you aren't likely to find much with an OFR that's non-floating. I had a guitar with a licensed FR non-floating trem and the D-Tuna wouldn't fit. Limited use - and no way to make the thing physically work on a floating trem, so &#8230; well, yeah, not for me.


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## GuitarBizarre (May 24, 2016)

MajorTom said:


> It's been done before and I'm pretty sure thousands of kids around the world have replaced the allen key bolts on the nut with the same style of ones used for the fine tuners on thd bridge, I know I did as a teenager. In fact the guitar I did it too is still like that to this day I'm sure, but this nothing new, kids have been doing this since the stone ages when I was twelve and desperate to put my weiner to good use.
> 
> This may be the first time that a guitar manufacturer has made it commercially available instead encouraging kids to do more with their brain cells than abuse them and introduce them to Leary and Chong.
> 
> ...



It's not the first time a manufacturer has done it - There's this, for one - Bill Edwards Finger-Tite Locking Nut

Yamaha also made an attempt at this on their RGX-620 and the Wes Borland Signature Models.

As for the Floyd Rose system, you're talking about the speedloader, which failed miserably because you couldn't use normal strings with it, and had to buy their specially Calibrated Speedloader sets.


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## GuitarBizarre (May 24, 2016)

bostjan said:


> My  - I can get hex keys for $0.65 at the hardware store, and I'm not stingy about having one in each guitar case, one in my backpack, and even one in my wallet. The only time there is an issue is when some off brand trem manufacturer uses an oddball size screw or something.
> 
> So, what problem does this solve for me? Nothing, really. Do I want a bulky doodad on my guitar? Not really. Do I still think it's cool somebody is playing with this? I guess - I dunno, as others said, it's kind of late in the game for this. I think a lot of people are in my boat, that they already adjusted to using a hex key, or decided to use a different style of trem or no trem at all. Even seeing something like this ten years ago would have been too late.
> 
> ...



I've wanted an answer to this for a long time - The Tremol-No guys are quite clear that if you take all the strings off your guitar, the tremol-no won't hold that kind of tension, and the springs will force it to move.

But wouldn't Tremol-No + D-Tuna make it pretty easy to use a D-Tuna on a floating OFR? It's only being asked to hang onto a couple extra pounds of force after all, not 60+.


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## cip 123 (May 24, 2016)

Didn't Kahler have something similar on the nut years ago? I remember Jason Beckers original Bluey had something similar at the nut.


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## GuitarBizarre (May 24, 2016)

cip 123 said:


> Didn't Kahler have something similar on the nut years ago? I remember Jason Beckers original Bluey had something similar at the nut.



Kahler's nuts are a weird history - I believe they did have a version of the Finger-Tite I just mentioned, but I'm not clear on whether that was an aftermarket thing marketed very weakly, or if it was ever a production option on anything.

The normal Kahler nuts however, were basically a floyd nute behind the actual nut, and worked terribly, because they allowed the strings to stick in the nut - the exact problem Floyd Rose's solution avoided. (Of course, they had no choice, while Floyd's idea was under patent, so whatever, but this was one reason kahler have repeatedly failed on the market)


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## jl-austin (May 24, 2016)

I am kind of missing the point of this, I guess. I am sure Vai has a guitar tech. For the rest of us, what is the big deal about keeping a set of tools? I mean you have to have a place for extra strings right? Why not keep the tool there, like we all do.

My biggest complaint is that the nut puts extra weight in a place where you really don't want extra weight (at the end of a neck). Then also, as pointed out, the tremolo isn't double locking.

Why not just use locking tuners and a non-locking tremolo?


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## bostjan (May 24, 2016)

jl-austin said:


> Why not just use locking tuners and a non-locking tremolo?





Ken Parker had a really nice trem design twenty years ago that addressed all of these issues, and others. I recall a few other setups recently after that used a multimode single or double locking trem with locking tuners. None of that ever caught on. I know that the Parker system worked like a charm for me. I think the OFR was around long enough that people got used to it and anything different looked weird. Now, maybe, we are in a place where some bulky gadget can be added to a normal-looking thing to give us a tiny bit of the functionality of the weird-looking things nobody liked decades ago.


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## xwmucradiox (May 24, 2016)

bostjan said:


> Ken Parker had a really nice trem design twenty years ago that addressed all of these issues, and others. I recall a few other setups recently after that used a multimode single or double locking trem with locking tuners. None of that ever caught on. I know that the Parker system worked like a charm for me. I think the OFR was around long enough that people got used to it and anything different looked weird. Now, maybe, we are in a place where some bulky gadget can be added to a normal-looking thing to give us a tiny bit of the functionality of the weird-looking things nobody liked decades ago.



The parker trem is a beautiful looking piece of hardware but it doesn't have enough string pressure over those ball bearings. If you dive bomb with it the strings ping and click all over the place. Its not a smooth sounding design. Would have been better if they did strings through the block rather than top load.


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## Señor Voorhees (May 24, 2016)

Less sh_i_t to lose is the biggest positive to something like this outside of saving a bit of time, which is also always nice. You don't have to worry about misplaced or dropped hex wrenches. On top of that, you don't have to worry about the little blocks in the locking bridge side of things. Never much of an issue, but I have dropped each of them at some point, and I can only imagine if I wasn't at home in a workspace, finding them afterwards would have been a pain in the ass.

That said, it's just a thing that adds convenience. Like a string winder or something. Even better, one of those electric string winders. Completely unnecessary, but it shaves seconds off of a boring task, so why not? I won't ever decide to buy or pass on a guitar because it had something like this, but it's still pretty cool. What is there to hate?


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## Randy (May 24, 2016)

xwmucradiox said:


> The parker trem is a beautiful looking piece of hardware but it doesn't have enough string pressure over those ball bearings. If you dive bomb with it the strings ping and click all over the place. Its not a smooth sounding design. Would have been better if they did strings through the block rather than top load.



Never had a problem with mine. Between the different spring gauges and how much tension you can dial it in using the thumbwheel, there's a lot of 'wrong' ways to set it up. Are you sure the ones you used were correctly setup?


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## dr_game0ver (May 24, 2016)

strings through saddle is nothing new, the mid 80' kahler 2520 has it...


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## xwmucradiox (May 24, 2016)

Randy said:


> Never had a problem with mine. Between the different spring gauges and how much tension you can dial it in using the thumbwheel, there's a lot of 'wrong' ways to set it up. Are you sure the ones you used were correctly setup?



Mine is on a Nitefly which I believe is a different spring configuration than the leaf springs on a Fly. But the baseplate and string angle are the same which is my issue. When you dive bomb the strings pop up off the ball bearings which makes an annoying noise I dont get with other trems.


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## bostjan (May 24, 2016)

Neither of my two Parkers ever had a single problem with their trems. The flat springs were ultra-quiet, too, which makes going back to coiled springs seem so much noisier.


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## Sermo Lupi (May 24, 2016)

GuitarBizarre said:


> Kahler's nuts are a weird history - I believe they did have a version of the Finger-Tite I just mentioned, but I'm not clear on whether that was an aftermarket thing marketed very weakly, or if it was ever a production option on anything.
> 
> The normal Kahler nuts however, were basically a floyd nute behind the actual nut, and worked terribly, because they allowed the strings to stick in the nut - the exact problem Floyd Rose's solution avoided. (Of course, they had no choice, while Floyd's idea was under patent, so whatever, but this was one reason kahler have repeatedly failed on the market)



I have a guitar with a Kahler, and actually the 'behind the nut' locking nut is probably more of a design feature than a flaw. Regular nuts are easily replaced, re-filed, and honestly don't bind much at all, whereas a floyd locking nut leaves you with less flexibility. Kahler's system basically just leaves you with the advantages of the existing nut while adding functionality for locking--trust me, those strings aren't moving once they're locked down. 

Also, anecdotes are only worth so much, but of the guitars I own, one has a Floyd and one has a Kahler. But do the job equally well and, while they definitely feel a bit different, they have about the same tuning stability. If anything I'd say the Kahler is slightly more stable, actually. That's the 2300 model. 

And as for the tool-less locking nut, yeah, Kahler's been doing that for ages. Not really a new concept, but if Floyd Rose can put their own spin on it, all the power to them.


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## edsped (May 25, 2016)

GuitarBizarre said:


> I've wanted an answer to this for a long time - The Tremol-No guys are quite clear that if you take all the strings off your guitar, the tremol-no won't hold that kind of tension, and the springs will force it to move.
> 
> But wouldn't Tremol-No + D-Tuna make it pretty easy to use a D-Tuna on a floating OFR? It's only being asked to hang onto a couple extra pounds of force after all, not 60+.



Tremol-No + D-Tuna works fine, but you need a top mounted floating Floyd or a route for the D-Tuna, like some of Nuno's guitars have.


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## StevenC (May 25, 2016)

jl-austin said:


> I am kind of missing the point of this, I guess. I am sure Vai has a guitar tech. For the rest of us, what is the big deal about keeping a set of tools? I mean you have to have a place for extra strings right? Why not keep the tool there, like we all do.



Vai does have a guitar tech, his name is Thomas Nordegg and he's much more into gear and tinkering than Steve. Not only that, but I imagine he deals with a lot more Edge setups and string changes than Steve. I'd say there's a good chance this idea didn't come from Steve.


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## Dayn (May 25, 2016)

StevenC said:


> Vai does have a guitar tech, his name is Thomas Nordegg and he's much more into gear and tinkering than Steve. Not only that, but I imagine he deals with a lot more Edge setups and string changes than Steve. I'd say there's a good chance this idea didn't come from Steve.


With Vai's shows and the amount of guitars he has, I imagine there's a lot of time and effort to be saved by his tech without having to fiddle with allen keys, screws, and blocks.


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## Nag (May 25, 2016)

because the worst thing when being on tour with the band is needing an allen key, right ?


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## Dayn (May 25, 2016)

I'd be more concerned with losing the fiddly screws and string blocks. Ten guitars, 60 little fiddly parts that each has a chance of being dropped or lost.


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## Science_Penguin (May 25, 2016)

Dayn said:


> I'd be more concerned with losing the fiddly screws and string blocks. Ten guitars, 60 little fiddly parts that each has a chance of being dropped or lost.



That's what I like about Kahler's design- everything's screwed on like a nice well-put together machine. Floyd's "screws mashing against blocks mashing against strings" design always seemed to me like a jury rigged garage project intended as a prototype, but then someone said "Nah, that works, let's roll with it!"


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## Grindspine (May 25, 2016)

Gotoh designed a tool-less Floyd licensed bridge back in 1985 for the WRC (Wayne Charvel) Gibson model. Tool-less clamping that is; Allen screws are still needed for saddle height and intonation.







I scored one of these for an older guitar and adore the design.


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## Leviathus (May 25, 2016)

I thought this was super old news and they scrapped the idea a while ago....


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## Rachmaninoff (May 25, 2016)

jl-austin said:


> Why not just use locking tuners and a non-locking tremolo?



Because it will never be stable as a double-locking system. I own PRS, EBMM... they're pretty good, but my Ibanez is a level above, Edge system simply _won't go out of tune_, it doesn't matter how much abuse I inflict. 

Guthrie Govan, who openly says to hate double-locking systems, gave up the non-locking tremolo years ago. Now he's using a locking tremolo with locking tuners and a bone nut lubricated with Big Bends Nut Sauce... and he still retunes his guitar after almost each song (although he hits heally heavy on his 010's).


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## OmegaSlayer (May 26, 2016)

About the ball bearings, I think the insanely pricey bridge that Yamaha Custom line had in the 90s was ace.
I'll take pics of how it works for you guys when I get back home.





(this is an image I found on the net)

But...the only consideration is that there's one thing working against us guitarists, and it's money.
We won't ever have the perfect bridge because patents and stuff.
Even the most perfectEST bridge will miss a usefully feature or 2.


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## Andromalia (May 26, 2016)

Well, patents aren't eternal even if we won't see their end ourselves. 
That said, even if the end result isn't good, it's cool people still do research on trems.


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## bostjan (May 26, 2016)

Dayn said:


> I'd be more concerned with losing the fiddly screws and string blocks. Ten guitars, 60 little fiddly parts that each has a chance of being dropped or lost.



QFT.

I recall losing the 3rd string during a show and then realizing after the show that my main guitar was missing a tiny saddle block. Luckily I brought a backup guitar with a standard fixed bridge.


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## GuitarBizarre (May 26, 2016)

Andromalia said:


> Well, patents aren't eternal even if we won't see their end ourselves.
> That said, even if the end result isn't good, it's cool people still do research on trems.



Utility Patents are only 20 years. Most of us will survive to see every patented product we think is revolutionary now, become obsolete and public domain. And then some.


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## shadowlife (May 27, 2016)

I'd rather just keep an extra allen key on hand.

Vigier's locking trem is still my favorite, and the standard by which i judge all others.


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## Scordare (May 27, 2016)

Here is the Kahler design






I love tremolo guitars and have never really understood the hate for cutting off ball ends and having wrenches...


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## Scordare (May 27, 2016)

Grindspine said:


> Gotoh designed a tool-less Floyd licensed bridge back in 1985 for the WRC (Wayne Charvel) Gibson model. Tool-less clamping that is; Allen screws are still needed for saddle height and intonation.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




This is very interesting...the only other place I have seen this tremolo is on the Moridira Hurricane LTD 2...the guitar Jason becker played and recorded Perpetual Burn with.


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## bloodjunkie (May 28, 2016)

I'd be interested, it would be quite useful on tour IMO.


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## MajorTom (Jun 1, 2016)

GuitarBizarre said:


> It's not the first time a manufacturer has done it - There's this, for one - Bill Edwards Finger-Tite Locking Nut
> 
> Yamaha also made an attempt at this on their RGX-620 and the Wes Borland Signature Models.
> 
> As for the Floyd Rose system, you're talking about the speedloader, which failed miserably because you couldn't use normal strings with it, and had to buy their specially Calibrated Speedloader sets.



You are right with the speedloader, I just for the life of me couldn't remember the reason for it's failure.


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## kherman (Jun 8, 2016)

Pikka Bird said:


> I can't figure out what the deal is with that nut and the screws on two of the levers. And the trem itself looks like a regular non-locking dealio.
> 
> In any case, it looks rather odd, and I'd much rather have Bill Edwards' Finger-Tite nut, which works exactly like a modern bicycle skewer and even looks halfway sleek:
> 
> ...



Reminds me of the Kahler Flip Lok


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## laxu (Jun 9, 2016)

Honestly the Floyd Rose bridge and nut are just so bad in many ways. Sure, they work really well when everything is setup and locked down but it's just unwieldy to operate on.

You'd imagine the locking nut could be done with something that has a single incospicuous lever for locking the strings. Likewise on the bridge end intonation adjustment shouldn't be such a big damn annoyance and there shouldn't be tons of screws in the first place.

By comparison the headless bridges and trems make a lot more sense to me.


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## bostjan (Jun 9, 2016)

laxu said:


> Honestly the Floyd Rose bridge and nut are just so bad in many ways. Sure, they work really well when everything is setup and locked down but it's just unwieldy to operate on.
> 
> You'd imagine the locking nut could be done with something that has a single incospicuous lever for locking the strings. Likewise on the bridge end intonation adjustment shouldn't be such a big damn annoyance and there shouldn't be tons of screws in the first place.
> 
> By comparison the headless bridges and trems make a lot more sense to me.



Hmm. Well, the FR system was great for its time (starting nearly 40 years ago), but yes, there have been many better systems to come along since. Guitarist will always be prone to nostalgia, though, when choosing a new instrument.

I'd love to see more designs. My puzzlement is that from what we can see of this design (in the OP), there's not really anything novel about it.


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## GuitarBizarre (Jun 9, 2016)

bostjan said:


> Hmm. Well, the FR system was great for its time (starting nearly 40 years ago), but yes, there have been many better systems to come along since. Guitarist will always be prone to nostalgia, though, when choosing a new instrument.
> 
> I'd love to see more designs. My puzzlement is that from what we can see of this design (in the OP), there's not really anything novel about it.



The fact is, the OFR design's core principle is still the best principle for solving tuning problems when using a tremolo. You can either ensure the same exact amount of movement in several places when using the tremolo, or you can ensure no movement at all.

The latter of those options is clearly easier and more effective.

As for the multitude of screws and so on in the floyd rose design... Honestly? Those things are the way they are because they're the best way to do what needs to be done. There's no point reinventing a clever saddle locking mechanism if a screw works just fine to keep it in the point of intonation.

Are there flaws with the OFR? Sure. The fine tuners kinda get in the way, knife edges are arguably worse than ball bearings for return to pitch, springs rattle and so on.

But the things that are screwed down? I don't think there's really a better way to do those things. You could make them more user friendly and rely on less tools, but all you'd achieve by doing that would be adding in more and more moving parts to a design that honestly works better the fewer parts there are in it.

As for intonation... this is a legitimate complaint, but honestly? SEVERAL Floyd Rose intonation tools are out there that are easy to use and readily available. It's not the end of the world to go out and buy one, and then your problems are over.


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## GtrBillEdwards (Jul 26, 2016)

I'd like to respond with some actual first person information, since I'm the person who actually invented the tool-free locking nut. To explain this sufficiently and hopefully in an interesting way, first Id like to go back to the beginning, in the 1980s when I owned a guitar store that did a lot of repairs, building and customization. The Floyd Rose double-locking tremolo actually stayed in tune by eliminating the string slippage and friction at the nodes (ie., the bridge saddles and nut slots.) Unfortunately, as many of my customers found out at the most inopportune times, the hex cap screws and allen wrenches used to lock the strings at the nut also twisted the string pairs (between the lock blocks and the baseplate) out of tune - and not in a predictable or precise way. While neither Floyd Rose nor Helmut Schaller, the manufacturer, could solve this problem, they came up with a simple workaround: .the fine tuners from early violin technology (later adopted by Gibson for a stop tailpiece and yes, manufactured by Schaller) would be adapted to fit to the Rose bridge. For Kramer and Rose, this was a solution they felt was sufficient (in spite of the fact the bass E fine tuner screw was in the way of your picking hand). At the very same time however, I had been working on a locking solution that simply did not require an external tool. After a couple of years and several false starts, a cam and lever shape was produced that had sufficient mechanical advantage to do the job of retaining the string pairs against their full force up to pitch. (!) We had ground down our Lock Blocks to the optimal height for a given string gauge to achieve the correct positioning or timing of the Cam Lever and the combination was just as strong or stronger than the Rose/Kramer/Schaller/locking nut. Interestingly, the action of locking the strings did not affect the strings and therefore did not detune the strings - even when unlocking. This was an significant and unexpected benefit. I had contacted several potential (usually skeptical) licensees to measure interest and line up production and distribution (including Kahler, DiMarzio and Hoshino/Ibanez, to name a few) and we agreed to meet at the next trade show and they could see it in action for themselves and dispel their doubts. At the NAMM show in Anaheim, Floyd Rose approached me and said hed tried and failed to make a design like mine. Interestingly and disturbingly, he also started to show me ways to improve my design - none of which would have worked and we ended up in an argument less than five minutes after wed met. (At the time it seemed like he had simultaneously forgotten that hed been unable to solve the problem himself and was unable to appreciate how much time and effort it took me to find a workable solution.) Anyway, he asked to show my design to the Kramer people (mainly Dennis Berardi, Kramer president) and they expressed a serious interest in it. I felt that joining them would insulate me from a possible lawsuit of attrition from Rose and the association with Van Halen and Kramer would insure universal adoption and create a new and better standard for locking nuts. At the time, the Kramer electric was the best selling guitar in the world due in a large part to the Van Halen endorsement and the Rose tremolo. I joined Kramer via an license (said to be identical to Floyd Roses but with suspicious whitespace gaps) and at the very next show six months later, they took enough orders to make me an overnight millionaire. Production, however was stalled. There were none to sell. While Id given Kramer an exclusive license for my invention, Kramer had given Schaller the job of making the parts..

Schaller

Schaller had survived WWII (yes, an ex-Nazi) and eventually managed to put together a factory that made parts inexpensively for American guitar manufacturers, namely Gibson and Fender among others. The strength of the dollar against the German mark seemed to be a significant part of that equation at the time. Like most people, I became familiar with the Schaller name via his tuning machines, which were among the first to feature sealed, permanently lubricated worm/gear mechanisms. It was considered a quality product. I found out later that Schaller, however, was still stuck in a post-WWII manufacturing mentality in the 1980s. His factory model was based on rooms of dozens of low-paid German women working at tables pulling levers on mechanisms designed to assemble various parts into completed assemblies. My invention was made possible by CNC (computer numerical control) accuracy and tolerances of .001 or greater. Bluntly put: his manufactured prototypes did not work worth a ..... Not only that, he was an arrogant sumbitch as my grandad would say. Rather than making what was actually on my precisely-drawn print, he attempted to redesign my carefully researched Cam Lever profile to fit his own half-assed idea of how it should work. Who does that remind you of? Correct. Floyd once told me that he and Helmut dont get along very well. Not only was Schaller unable to hit the center of the cam correctly, he made parts that would simply break when you exerted the force necessary to clamp! My frustration was mounting. To make matters worse, Id been relegated by Schaller to dealing with his son, Rene, who I considered to be nothing more than a dilettante. Rene had recently come back to work for his father because hed gone bankrupt trying to run a casino - as he told it. He claimed to be an engineer but when I asked for his schooling credentials he allowed as how he wasn't that kind of engineer. Like Floyd had done a year or two earlier, I was sent to Germany to find out what the problem was at the Schaller factory and get the parts made to fill the tens of thousands of orders that Kramer had amassed. The problem was obvious: they did not have the technology sufficient to build the part correctly. My prototypes had been made with CNC accuracy, but Schaller was still stuck in 1940s. 

During this delay I started to ask some pointed questions about how they were going to meet their obligations to Kramer and some revealing explanations for the delays were being offered. They had been approached by Fender to produce a similar product for their guitars and had been spending time reverse-engineering my invention for Fender instead of making parts for Kramer! I couldnt believe it. This was a kind of betrayal and corruption that Id never experienced before. I later found out the Helmut had (barely concealed) contempt for Kramer, Berardi and Rose. He considered them upstarts and favored his older clients like Gibson and Fender. To my horror, I suddenly realized that I was at the center of an international corporate espionage in the guitar industry. 

While all this was going on, Kahler, whom Id never even gotten a chance to talk to at NAMM, decided to do what Fender was doing: reverse engineer my invention and make copies of my work. I found out that Yamaha had also filed a patent in Japan less than a month after the NAMM show for what seemed to be (from the drawings) an identical copy of my invention. I later found out later Hoshino/Ibanez also made a copy. The list of copycats got very long very fast. Ill admit that Id underestimated the potential impact of my invention on the guitar industry. 

One thing the copies had in common is they had fatal flaws. They all rushed to market to claim a share of what they were sure would be a big winner. They all failed to take into account the subtleties that made my design work. 

I was told by Berardi at some point that the public would not accept my design as is, where the user had to grind down the Lock Blocks to the correct size for their strings. For me, this was a five minute procedure and easily done. Not a big deal. Youd only need to do this again if you changed the string gauges and Id allowed for a lot of material on the Blocks for this very reason. Were talking a few thousandths of an inch and a couple of minutes time with a grinder or some sandpaper. 

Schaller was taking directions from Berardi on this and I was stuck in a contract that had not paid me a nickel. At one point Schaller (Im not kidding) suggested we attach a flat spring to the bottom of the Baseplate! Yeah youre an engineer. So in desperation I came up with an intermediary device that allowed the Cam-Screw Assembly to move up and down relative to the Baseplate. It is called the Internal Adjuster Screw. Still they could not get the Cam Levers themselves correctly made. 

So two years after that NAMM show where I had hundreds of industry people crowding around my little booth for three days non-stop, I have a manufacturer who is clearly incompetent, a licensee that isnt paying me and a horde of copycats flooding the market with half-assed copies. The I get a call from Rene Schaller to tell me that they are abandoning my design. I .... you not.

Id sunk all my store money into this project and couldnt imagine a way it could fail but it did. I went back to the CNC prototype people and ordered a production run and paid them on credit. I went back to NAMM and instead of the great welcome and accolades Id experienced two years prior, I heard the same line over and over: Oh I got one of those from (Kahler; Fender; Yamaha; Ibanez, etc.,) and they don't work. The damned copycats had poisoned the well and killed my beautiful little invention. So as you might imagine, I was frustrated and enraged by this experience and this stayed with me for a long time. 

Long story short - I put my energies into my other invention generically known as The CAGED System and my books and videos entitled Fretboard Logic and that story has a much happier ending. As a matter of update and the reason Im reposting this in this blog, a few years ago I was asked by a friend to consider revisiting the Finger-Tite Locking Nut and in doing so help him and millions of others avoid the still existing hassles associated with the Floyd Rose. I found I had no bad feelings about it anymore and thought it might even be fun to go back to the drawing board again. Another long story short - I managed to reproduce all the designs from memory and even came up with a few new ones. Id always wanted to see if I could make the Adjuster Screw accessible externally and I was able to do this. The result is that I have not four different models to choose from, but five. My newest solution produces a version that you can install on the Floyd Rose baseplate itself, without even removing the strings! I call it the Floyd Nut Conversion Kit or FNCK. So everybody with a Floyd Rose tremolo can get FNCKed! These are in production and have been available for the last couple of years. The Steve Vai locking nut is a copy - intention or not - it is a copy and the fact that my FNCK models have been in production is proof. Check it out: http://www.billedwards.com


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## CapnForsaggio (Jul 26, 2016)

Thank you for your insight into the "bizz."

Guitar manufacturers haven't gotten any worse, but it seems they haven't gotten any better. And China has PERFECTED the art of ripping off designs nowadays.

I'm glad that you found success with other IP. I went through the "CAGED" system with a guitar teacher in the mid 90s. If you are the one responsible, I owe you a beer!

Thanks again, Capn Forsaggio


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## marcwormjim (Jul 27, 2016)

I too owe the man a quality drink for putting himself out there. As someone who formerly dreaded using NAMM to do business, the extent to which I can sympathize with your story informs what I cannot with a sense of horror. Good on you for not being completely and utterly crushed and ruined by the experience, as so many have.


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## laxu (Jul 27, 2016)

Very interesting story. I guess the new nut design was not patented (at least globally) so other firms were able to try to replicate it without getting sued? 

I'd like to fit one of the Bill Edwards locking nuts on my only Floyd Rose equipped guitar but alas the price is too steep with shipping and taxes if I order direct. Are these sold anywhere in Europe?


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## Malkav (Jul 27, 2016)

I am also curious about this, I don't suppose there's any chance of a 7 string version of it becoming available?


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## bostjan (Jul 27, 2016)

GtrBillEdwards said:


> I'd like to respond with some actual first person information, ...
> Check it out: http://www.billedwards.com



Wow! I had no idea that much had been going on behind the scenes. I was just starting out when you were doing your thing. I distinctly remember the Kramer superstrats that came equipped with this system, and I was a big fan of the functionality of the design. It's a real shame that politics got in the way of progress.


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