Snake oil or not?

When I modified the mahogany strat I definitely was aiming for a 'hot rodded' one.

One of the things I dislike about strats is when the tremolo isn't very stable in use. I get you can't hang off it like a locking one, but I want to be able to use it a little. However tuning wasn't that stable, despite the quite decent 'modern' Wilkinson tremolo I fitted.

It already had decent locking machine heads but with the string trees currently fitted the strings were going through quite a steep angle from the nut. I sort of figured this is half the problem. I was considering spacing them out from the face of the headstock with some washers but managed to pick up some GraphTech Tusq string trees cheaply that are not only slightly taller but supposedly made of magic lubricating stuff.

Having fitted these it certainly keeps tune better when you use the tremolo, is that because of the gentler angle, the smooth contoured slots in the trees or the magic lubricating stuff they're made of?

I may tread this very well worn road some more and fit a GraphTech nut as well. The current nut is dirty and chipped anyway, even though it's 100% usable.

Ideally I'd also like to fit the 2-point tremolo I bought, which I'll revisit at some point.

Can you tell I'm putting off sanding.

2 comments:

Rupert said...

One of the things I dislike about Strats...? Only one... I don't have enough time to list all the things I dislike.
Why thank you Mr Paul, I will play one of your guitars.
Such snobbery, snigger.

Nick Reynolds said...

I reckon I might be able to find a photo of you playing a strat. :-)