the more the springs, the harder the bendings? or vice versa?

[piaggio]

Hello everybody !
first of all, forgive my limpy english.
I'm the happy owner of a strat, that stays in tune with no particular problem .
but I'm a paranoia guy and I'd like to be sure with some spring more.
but I have a pair of doubts :
2)If I add another spring (now they are 3), bendings will be harder to do ?
I read somewhere that the more the springs are bended, the easier bendings are. so if you add another spring, they should be less bended, and bendings should get harder, right ? or wrong ?
and what if I block the bridge, with a woodblock, like I want to do?
2)I have 3 springs : on one of the two remaining free "hooks", on the far right, there is a soldering (some ground, I guess) that would not allow me to put a spring on it.
if I only put another spring on the other free one (far left) the unbalanced situation will cause any trouble to the intonation ?

[Boris Bubbanov]

I find when I add an additional trem spring, or tighten the trem claw screws, the rear of the bridge plate will come to rest closer to the surface of the body. Additional tension on the strings will be lost when you retune to 440.

But does bending change, given that the tension on the strings is still the same?
My answer is yes, at least for me. As bending gets harder when you lower the action, and getting the bridgeplate to come to rest lower will definitely lower your action.

However, some people follow the additional trem spring with the raising of the saddles, to restore the action they once had. Question, will bending be different then? Answer, I don't think so.

The real answer is, you like to bend a lot? Buy a G + L hardtail.

Welcome,

Bubbanov

[tazzboy]

The More springs you have the less you can bend is true in a sense that if you want to get reverb or sustain out your stratocaster then you would most diffentely add more springs. SRV had 5 springs in Number even then see him wiggle the bar on songs like Voodoo Chile he still used 5 tension springs.

If you like to bend a tremendous amount do like Boris side or replace the nut on your guitar with Fender LRS roller nut.

[NewOldStock]

The more springs you add, the harder it is for the bridge to be moved during a bend. That should be pretty easy to agree upon.

Now, let's say you're doing a fairly common 2 semitone bend. A bend will require less travel, or chasing of the note, when the bridge is able to move less. The surrounding strings also have less of a chance to go flat when the bending string is at work.

I have all 5 springs installed and the claw tightened all the way down. It'd take a crowbar to lift the bridge away from the body. When I do bends the string travel is the same amount as with my fixed bridge Tele(both are 25 1/2" scale). When I play a students 3-spring setup it requires much more bend to achieve the same note, and double-stop bends sound just horrible, to me, as that 2nd non-bent string goes flat from the moving bridge.

So I say the more spring there are, the easier it is to bend, since less distance is required to achieve the same note. Less bridge movement.

[Boris Bubbanov]

Thanks for your post, New Old Stock.

I like this line of thought: With a trem better secured, there's less 'slop' in the whole assembly, making controlling your bends far easier. I always prefer doing bends on hard tail guitars, it makes such sense that the more we model our Strats like hardtails, the better our bends will be.

Like a car with a stiffened, lowered suspension; better control.


Bubbanov

[NewOldStock]

Originally Posted by Boris Bubbanov

Thanks for your post, New Old Stock.

I've enjoyed dozens, if not hundreds, of your informative posts at TDPRI. It's a complement. Thanks

[mustang_steve]

yep, adding more springs will stabilize the bridge, increasing sustain....but adding more springs will also make it harder to set up any "float"....for a proper float, the spring tension must equal the string tension...in which case you add mroe springs when using heavier strings. It's all in what you want to accomplish.

Myself, for a standard set of 10s, 3 springs does it.

[piaggio]

thanks for the answers, but I guess you have all misunderstood my question :
I was not asking if it's harder to pull-push the trem bar with more springs...I was asking if it's harder to bend the strings with your fingers, like in country music et the like, if you put more springs, therefore reducing the tension of the single spring.
since the "string-bridge-spring" combo acts as it was a single spring unit, the more is tightened, the easier is to bend it on the side.
add another spring-reduce tension-the harder the bendings.

I'm I going completely crazy ?

[NewOldStock]

I was asking if it's harder to bend the strings with your fingers, like in country music

I think that's what most of us are talking about. I haven't even used a trem-bar in 17 years. Only string bending.

This is why many of us and players like Clapton use 5 springs, with many also blocking their bridges.

Am I going completely crazy, too?

[piaggio]

the day the forum went nuts...
ok, let's go with the fourth spring !
and let's see what happens !
(still I have some doubts about the unsymmetrical (wow!) disposition of the springs)

THANK YOU , strat people !

[Axis29]

'asymmetrical' I believe is the word you meant. LOL

I have no experience with more than three springs (though I may try it just for S's & G's). But I cannot imagine that adding more springs lower the tension on anything.... Of course, you still tune your strings to the same concert pitch, so I'm not sure of the physics of it all... But the resistance supplied by two additional springs could not reduce the total resistance. You are still trying to resist the force of more springs, right?

I can see how you might not have to push the string as far to create the tension required to bend the note up a set tone (like say 1/2 step, whole step, etc). But to bend a note from , say 440 to 460, on the same string, it would still require the same amount of force, right?

[NewOldStock]

But to bend a note from , say 440 to 460, on the same string, it would still require the same amount of force, right?

Not really. You're forgetting factors of friction like the additional travel distance over the crown of the frets, or that of the fingerboard if you have lower frets and are making contact there as well. These resistances will very depending on the polish/smoothness of the frets/fingerboard, but they are factors that introduce more required force needed to achieve that 440 to 460 bend, mentioned above.

Very rough frets will magnify this effect. Well polished frets will be less noticeable. But it still comes down to travel distance required.

[Axis29]

Originally Posted by NewOldStock

Not really. You're forgetting factors of friction like the additional travel distance over the crown of the frets, or that of the fingerboard if you have lower frets and are making contact there as well. These resistances will very depending on the polish/smoothness of the frets/fingerboard, but they are factors that introduce more required force needed to achieve that 440 to 460 bend, mentioned above.

Very rough frets will magnify this effect. Well polished frets will be less noticeable. But it still comes down to travel distance required.

But if all things are equal... same frets, same strings, same fret board, same nut, same saddles... heck, same action even, wouldn't adding springs, add resistive force to the string when you begin to bend it, bringing it to a higher pitch faster, but taking the same amount of force to get the string to the same pitch?

In other words, it would take the same amount of finger strain to push the string to the pitch, but your finger tips would move a shorter distance to reach that pitch.... At least that's the theory I want to put out there! LOL

[Boris Bubbanov]

Originally Posted by piaggio

the day the forum went nuts...
ok, let's go with the fourth spring !
and let's see what happens !
(still I have some doubts about the unsymmetrical (wow!) disposition of the springs)

THANK YOU , strat people !

I do try to keep the springs into the block somewhat symmetrical, but a little skewing shouldn't be bad. For the record, I was talking about finger-induced bends as I have long since lost track of most of my trem bars and maybe just do a little palm wiggle mostly. I use the trem bar mostly in testing and setup, to check tuning stability, etc. Then the arm is put away.
What I find is different guitars want to 'float' with different amounts of springs, different amounts of tightening of the trem claw. I don't block mine, I don't want the plate dead crashed down onto the surface of the guitar body, but I also don't want the plate jacked up in the air. So I will change the springs numbers, trem claw position, string guage, and sometimes even the saddle heights to get where I'm going. But the next Strat 30 minutes later will call for something different.

Bubbanov