I realize keeping your guitar in tune relys on many factors, how many springs gives the best results on keeping the trem block stationary, without blocking it in place?

5 springs

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No no and no

It's not a matter of how many springs, but of how well the guitar is setup. I have seen as few as 2 springs do just fine.

Personally I use 5 springs.

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Chet Feathers

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I didn't Lose my mind, I traded it for this guitar.

Yeah it really depends on how it is setup....

It's more of a personal thing.
I found 3 springs were too light and 5 felt too heavy for my liking so I am currently using 4
with .10's or 11's for strings, mostly stick to 10's..

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Keep on Truckin, Going full speed ahead down the highway to hades.

I have found that the less wire you have wrapped around your machine heads drastically affects how well your guitar stays in tune. Keep in mind that even though the string is properly stretched out along the fretboard and such, the extra string length around the tuner post will take a while longer to stretch out.

Locking tuners helps but, if you don't have those, you need to find a method of wrapping your strings to use a few turns as possible. I've been using this guy's method for a while now and found that my guitar stays in tune very well:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp3mFAqyQFY&feature=PlayList&p=2C3CF5B8AD133A1B&index=0&playnext=1

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Calling an illegal alien an undocumented immigrant is like calling a drug dealer an undocumented pharmicist.

Thanks guys!
My new old strat came with three, I just added one to help stabilize it. I'll try it for a while and see what it feels like. 95' MIM Strat, set up with 10's.
Here's where I'm at wth it...
95' MIM strat 225
Fender locking tuners 55
earvana nut 40
strap locks 15
hwy one pickguard 25

Total 360

Theres still a few upgrades i want to add, but I'm happy with the improvements so far. Just trying to upgrade a bedroom guitar to a daily player.

My MIM Strat has 3 springs using 11`s and works well set up like that.