drop tunings and floyds...

[paulbag]

i'm going to be buying some books on setups and stuff but i have a question for anyone here who drops their e string with a floyd installed. do your guitars intonate properly? etc cuz my tech keeps basically telling me "you can't do that with a floyd" and have your guitar work and tune correctly, intonation, tension all that. i know the best thing to do would be getting guitars w/fixed bridges for that but i'm just curious. should i find a new tech?

[VitaminG]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

are you talking about regularly changing the tunings on a Floyd equipped guitar, or just setting up a dedicated drop-tuned guitar?

Setting up a Floyded guitar in an altered (or dropped) tuning is just the same as for regular A=440. You'll just make the same adjustments to bring the spring/string tension into balance as you would if you were changing string gauges or whatever. The lower you drop your tuning, the more you'll have to wind out the screws in the spring claw to keep your Floyd level.

If you intend to set up a guitar in standard and then regularly drop the low E string, you will find that the tuning on all your other strings will go out as you affect that string/spring balance.

[PallarAndersVisa]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

yeah some people think that they can move the fine tuner all the way down when setting up in standard, and just move the fine tuner all the way up and make the low E flat enough to reach D, but it brings the other strings out of tune as well. Floyds just dont work that way. even a D-tuna isnt 100% accurate

[Ace]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

If you set it up(including intonation) and leave it dropped tuned, you'll be fine. If you plan on changing it back and forth "on-the-fly", you will have tuning issues.

[toejam]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

[ QUOTE ]
yeah some people think that they can move the fine tuner all the way down when setting up in standard, and just move the fine tuner all the way up and make the low E flat enough to reach D, but it brings the other strings out of tune as well. Floyds just dont work that way. even a D-tuna isnt 100% accurate

[/ QUOTE ]
I've used the fine tuner method before... it was only a very tiny amount that the other strings went out of tune that it didn't bother me. Though, if you block the trem, you won't have a problem at all.
And with a D-Tuna, you WILL NOT go out of tune at all, because you need to have the trem blocked to begin with.

[paulbag]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

yeah i gotta decide which guitars to dedicate to a dropped e as well as e, e,flat or d. thats as low as i tune my guitars, one whole step. but a lot of stuff i have written also has the low e dropped on top of that,(c-g-c-f-a-d.) there were a couple of books (i posted a thread here) i'm gonna order today. also, one more question. i'm gonna need all the proper tools to do my own 'basic' setups. any good suggestions on what tools exactly and who or where i should look/order for these? i appreciate all you guys' help, really. i just always took my stuff to a tech but i only wanna have to bring stuff to him when it's really necessary. yearly checkups or whatever. i wanna be able to fine tune the feel of my guitars exactly the way i want them. thanks guys. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[Ace]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

Depends on the guitar you have.

You will need:
Set of automotive feeler gauges
Engineer's ruler
capo
Wrenches/screwdrivers to adjust bridge and truss rod(on most floating trems a 3mm Allen will work)

Additional handy gear:
Flashlight(so you can do a setup in a dark enviroment)
good quality tuner(accurate to .1 cent)
multimeter
soldering iron

[paulbag]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

thanks bro, much appreciative. [img]/images/graemlins/headbang.gif[/img]

[Deneb]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

When I drop the E to D on either of my soloists it also puts out the G B and little E string (the A and D stay pretty close).

Ideally, say you play in Standard tuning, and drop D. Have a guitar for each tuning, and another guitar you could go either way with as a backup. I usually take three guitars with me if I'm playing in standard (or Eb) and a drop D guitar if we're playing in it.

[paulbag]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

yeah, i'm just trying to decide which guitars to tune which way. then they'll each be dedicated to where they're at.

[Offrampmotel]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

Or get a string thru [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[Zerberus]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

D-Tuna and a Tremsetter if you wanna keep it floating, D-tuna (or fine Tuna [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]) and blocked if that doesn´t bother you.....in both cases your e-string will only intonate properly in ONE of the tunings, the one it was set up to.

[paulbag]

Re: drop tunings and floyds...

[ QUOTE ]
Or get a string thru [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

yeah, i'm in the process of convincing myself i need another "high end" jackson w/out a floyd! see what happens when you quit drugs? [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/headbang.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/band.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/headbang.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]
hmmm, kelly or king v?