SOLVED | Angled or Straight? | Floyd Rose Spring Tension

We all know the importance of Floyd Rose String tension, but what about SPRING tension? Are angled or strait strings better? Well, it depends on your setup. Make sure to check out the video so we can get your trem up and running!

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[hotmetalslugs]

So many theories on this. But he saved the best advice for the very last moment of the video: “play around with it”.

[BBGuitars]

Angling some springs will put the springs into different states of their stretch, effecting the rate at which your springs are trying to return to their set position, this is great for balancing the trem to return to pitch better than 3 or 4 applying the same force.

[GarryParker]

I angled the springs on my RG655's Edge trem recently. It's a great trem as it always returns to pitch and has the best flutters you could want. The problem was, it was too easy to send notes sharp when playing hard. I installed new springs and still it wasn't quite right, so I angled them and it did seem to make a difference.

[Alex_Martz]

I did the test on my guitar with 9-42 so I found that changing the outer springs angled vs straight didn't added or reduced tension BUT changed the FEEL of the whammy bar, so, changing the angle of springs won't make your guitar go out of tune if it's already set up properly, having the springs angled makes the whammy bar more precise, angled springs have increased LOAD not increased tension

[tonycarel]

Very informative, thanks for all of your knowledge and hours of research you did!! Keep the awesome content coming! ( Great channel BTW)

[ThrashMetalAJM]

Quick question.. I have the \ | / right now on one of my dimebag guitars and I notice when I try dime squeals the Lower E strings goes more lower then my other strings and I pick up extra noise while I’m trying to do my thing so I get more noise. How do I fix that?

[shawnbryant]

It's one of the most meaningful topics that I have do more struggling than anything for the last 47 years, so I need all the info I can get my hands on, but for Floyd rose tremolo, extra light strings, what brand trem. springs would you prefere, Floyd rose, FM, others?

[eamonahern]

I have the angled setup on my rhoads. I found it to be a bit on the stiff side at first but I'm used to the tension now and it gives me more control when I'm doing things like Jeff Hanneman's whammy bar fills in the South of Heaven "chaos rampant..." parts. I was doing setup adjustments on my guitar yesterday when it was time to change strings and just as I had the float position and neck relief right I decided to tweak the string height as it was a little too high. The high E string broke near the tuning peg as I was tuning it up one final time and it was too late to pop out for new strings. So I left the guitar in the case and got new strings this morning (2 sets and an individual E to replace the broken one). What happened? The B string broke this time! So I threw away the whole set and put on one of the new ones I bought this morning. I had to adjust the screws to get the float right again because I think adjusting the bridge to tweak the string height changed the float position as well. Anyway, with all my tweaking and adjusting, I finally got the bridge to sit right, the guitar tuned up and haven't had to touch the intonation because the 12th fret harmonics are still the same as the fretted notes. I left the guitar in the case to rest overnight with the nut unlocked after stretching and playing in the strings. I'll give the tuning one last tweak in the morning, lock the nut and it should be good to go.

[charlesb]

I found the setup that works on all my guitars is Fu-tone Titanium saddle blocks and screws with the biggest brass big blocks that pituitar guitar can take. I have that same set up on my original 1989 Kramer Nightswan, Kramer Dave Sabo guitar and my 1996 Hamer Californian. It was actually a huge difference on the Hamer as someone previously had 5 springs in it and played like crap. So 3 red Fu-tone springs solved that lol. All guitars use .011-.46 pure nickels strings and are tuned to E standard. All guitars flutter and stay in tune no matter hard you are on them. I actually highly recommend Fu-tone for any floating bridge, not just foe the improvement in tone, but the reliability is much better as well.

[vivekswamy]

I have Tuned my Guitar to Drop C. Should I add a 4th spring or change the angle of my 3 springs?

[ptbempire]

If I only have 2 springs would that be the cause for another string tuning up and down as I tune another string?

[SixString_J]

I think there is a lot of snake oil on the subject. Angles don’t add spring tension it adds spring load. The spring tension has to be equal to the string tension regardless of angled or straight. I think all it does is play around with the spring load meaning how far it is stretched. This is what effects the available travel and how much resistance to movement the whammy bar has. You always want enough spring load that you can pull up and not drop the springs out of the block or off the claw…. If you have the springs super loaded, the bar won’t want to dive easily or very far. I like 2 springs angled with a moderate spring load. It feels equal going up or down and works best for me

[jakelecroy]

Yeah I had a fight setting up 10's on an RG560. 3 springs had the claw screwed all the way in = limited dive. 4 springs did the job but the hard won lesson... When adjusting the claw screws, only an 1/8 turn at a time.

[lone-wolf-]

2:14 angling two springs does not increase string tension as much as you might think. If the outer two are pulling more, the middle straight one has to pull less. So the increment is divided by two. 😉
But then again: spring tension and string tension are allways in perfect balance. This means, if the springs are pulling harder, the open strings are getting sharp. So you have to release the claw, wich results in balancing the spring/string tension to initial. 🤷🏻
In the end, angling two springs is like having two and a half springs working.
Maybe good, if two springs are too soft, and three are not enough stretched to work properly. 🤔

[lone-wolf-]

I‘m not an advocate for angled springs.
Reasons:
1. for slightly more tension just screw the claw deeper
2. angled springs will slightly rotate at their anchor points, while the trem gets used. This unnecessarily increases friction, wich prevents getting back in tune.
3. the above mentioned rotational friction is even higher on the angled springs, what makes it harder to set back in tune.
4. the springs will ring at two different pitches. Could clash with each other and the notes played on strings, causing a dead spot at a certain pitch where the note does decay rapidly. If you already have a dead spot, now you end up with two.

The only nice effect you have with angled springs is the initial softer feel of the trem and it has more resistance the more you push/pull on the trem, because of the straight spring engaging later.

But everybody can do what he likes…

Cheers ✌🏼😊

Edit one year later: I just realized, that angling two springs does not increase string tension as much as you might think. If the outer two are pulling more, the middle straight one has to pull less. So the increment is divided by two. 😉
But then again: spring tension and string tension are allways (ideally) in perfect balance. This means, if the springs are pulling harder, the open strings are getting sharp. So you have to release the claw, wich results in balancing the spring/string tension to initial. 🤷🏻
In the end, angling two springs is like having two and a half springs working.
Maybe good, if two springs are too soft, and three are not enough stretched to work properly. 🤔

[Divebombs]

I like to play a lot of dimebag squeals but my guitar always goes out of tune every time I do so. Please help me how to adjust the springs 😥

[nielsanderson]

I recently bought a new brass bottom block for my Floyd rose tremolo and the springs keep jumping out now I checked and one way the springs angle down the other correct way it’s leveled I couldn’t believe that such a stupid thing could happen to me but it did so inform the folks about such a simple but major important thing

[erich]

I’m going from 9 to 10 and it’s got my tremolo offset a lot bc it already was with 9s. So I’m getting some heavy duty springs and I’m gonna mix and match and see what gets me the best position

[Mr.Goldbar]

I never use angled springs, straight springs always stay in tune better in my experience.
I can get the same benifit of angled springs by just adjusting the screws and without the loss in stability.
I usually go for 2 springs on a floating setup on a non locking trem and 3 springs on a Floyd or a decked setup. On my Gotoh and my Wilkinson bridges I like to have almost no resistance (and I already use light strings)

[dansev]

i’ve learned I’m too old for patience with this system lol. been messing around with my jackson soloist. bringing mine to my local tech and will pay for setup lol