never had any experience setting up anything with a floyd rose. is there any way to set the individual saddles on these contraptions? or is it just "it is what it is" sort of a thing... lots of hardware, but nothing moves. all the screws seem to just hold it together.

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I presume you mean adjusting the height of an individual saddle. You can raise them but without grinding the bottom of them, you can't lower them. For raising the saddle heights, ready made shims like this are available:

http://www.axcessories.com/proddetail.a ... xfrsdlshma

Or, you can also make these shims yourself out of thin sheet metal (which is what I do).

To install them, you must loosen the string, loosen and remove the intonation locking screw of the saddle and plant however many shims underneath whichever saddle(s) to suit, lining up the hole in the shim so that upon (loosely) replacing the intonation screw, the shim will be held in place, while you jockey the rest of it by hand so that it is totally under the saddle. It is at this point where you will have to tune and reintonate the string and then, retighten the intonation screw. Is this a pain in the buttocks? Somewhat if you've never done it before but like anything else, repetition makes it easy where you learn little personal 'tricks' to do it quickly, painlessly and efficiently.

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You dig?

thanks martian.
i'm going into this setup very much on the blind side... the guitar's a mess.
i've managed to straighten the neck and get the action down very nicely... i may be back with more questions.

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You're quite welcome and I'll be here.

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You dig?

so's the only way to adjust the intonation to loosen the string, loosen the screw, slide the saddle, tighten the screw, and tighten the string back?

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In a direct answer to your question, yes, it is an approximating, oftentimes repetitive process unless you have the special tools which allow you to keep the string at pitch with the intonation screw loose so that you can 'zero-in' the intonation like any other bridge. Here's what one of these tools (keys) look like:

http://www.floydupgrades.com/catalog/in ... cts_id=253

There are several variations of the above key referred to however. Which specific one to use depends on which specific Floyd (or variation thereof) is being serviced.

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You dig?

thanks again martian... so far... not a big fan of the floyd rose.
i've set up a few fenders, a few acoustics, a gretsch with a bigsby, couple of gibsons with and without tremolo's... this thing is just plain wierd.
the owner's a guy that answered an ad i put on craigslist looking for band members. he showed up to jam for a few the other day. when he pulled the guitar out of the bag i could see the strings were (literally) a 1/4 inch off the fretboard. i could see the bow in the neck right away and i offered to set it up for him.

well, i've got the guitar to a place where it's at least playable and i thank you very much for your help.

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You're quite welcome!

Frankly, I'm not a fan of Floyds either. Granted, they do their job but as you are finding out, when they are severely out of whack, restoring them to their optimum point can be a time consuming nuisance. Couple this with the fact that realistically speaking, any guitar which has one is stuck with it and for better or worse, must be dealt with.

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You dig?

Excellent advice all around from the Great Sage! I'd just like to add, I love and am a big fan of locking trems, beit Floyds or Khalers. Floyd's/Khaler's can have a steep learning-curve if your not familiar with them, but once properly setup - they are neigh bulletproof and maintenance free. People on the 'net spew a lot of hate about them on various forums, but 99.999% of the time people are having problems with cheap clones and knock-offs, or are over-tightening the crap out of various screws (often while the trem is under tension).

Simple Golden Rules for high performance, trouble-free locking tremolo systems:
1. Avoid copies and clones like The Plague, even on 'high end' instruments. If it doesn't say OFR or Schaller, keep walking. If an instrument otherwise is a perfect fit for you, plan on an immediate upgrade to the real deal.
2. NEVER adjust the trem under tension. (UNLESS: You know WTF you're doing and have the proper specific and specialized tools.)
3. You don't need an impact wrench to tighten locking nuts or string retainers! If your allen bolts or allen wrench are becoming rounded/stripped you're using way, Way, WAY to much force.

HTH,

ORC

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thanks orc,
this is a genuine floyd rose. i understand what you mean about proper tools, overtightning, too much force, and also how when properly adjusted you can't beat them... not that i've had any experience with locking trems... but it sounds a lot like the advice i get all the time about the 4-barrel holley carburetor sitting on top of my 355 cubic inch V-8. there are a lot of sensitive parts on there, but when adjusted properly.... yeowwww-w-w-watchouttttt!!

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