fender two point tremolo system - replace with flat bridge?

[SF audio]

I have a strat deluxe body routed for the 2 point American trem system. There's a custom shop bridge designed to replace vintage trem's - would it work with the two system? Can I convert my two point floating trem to a fixed bridge, even if it requires some routing/mods?

 

thanks

[baronedo]

I don't know about converting your trem body to a Hard tail or fixed position bridge. That could take a lot of tedious and risky work (e.g. filling in the trem recess with wood, glue, etc. positioning and mounting a fixed bridge properly).

 

I suggest you work with the body you have and instead try a better trem such as the trem bridges made by hipshotproducts.com. This company also makes the tremsetter which is a good trem stabilizer that I have on all my Strats. They have an innovative two post bridge which retrofits to the American Standard. You merely use their bridge mounting posts and bridge, which have a neat bind-free ball bearing design, in lieu of the American standard post and bridge. This hipshot trem bridge is a top notch design improvement over standard bridges and stays in tune even after vigorous trem use but without the drawbacks of a Floyd Rose bridge. A friend retrofitted his Amer. Standard Strat with one and really likes it. Check it out on their aforementioned website.

[Caevan O’Shite]

Personally, I'd either do pretty much the same as Lancer detils above, or simply have the bottom of the bridge-plate rest flat against the top of the body, useing all five springs with the claw backed in a good ways, and block in the inertia-block (that block of metal that the strings feed through) with a couple of pieces of wood on the underside, between the block and the walls in front of and behind it in its cavity. The trem will be immobilized, you'll get a fuller, more solid and sustaining tone, and you'll still get that touch of a sort of mechanical-reverb from the springs.

 

But there is at least one company out there other than Fender that makes a top-mounted hard-tail conversion unit, or at least there was; I believe that they had been featured in that Out Now advertising-showcase in Guitar Player magazine...