When I last updated, I had begun to install a Callaham bridge in my 70's Japanese RI Strat when I ran into some problems.
The bridge came with new (and considerably longer) bridge mounting hardware. This meant I was going to have to drill the holes deeper. I used a hand drill and added the extra depth needed for the new longer screws. After the screws were installed, just the tips of them had broken through the finish in the back of the guitar's spring cavity. It doesn't look bad and is covered up by the springs. I could have used the original screws and saved myself some drilling but I didn't. The finish in the spring cavity was already screwed up from the installation and subsequent removal of a Hipshot Tremsetter.
The Tremsetter mostly worked as advertised but to make it most effective you had to make the whammy bar action rather stiff and unresponsive. Additionally, I had to modify the block on the underside of the bridge to get it to accept the Tremsetter without banging into the plastic cover (which also has been removed and possibly lost in a parts bin somewhere).
I didn't install the spring claw that came with the bridge. I may get to that at a later point when I redo the electronics. The pots are 500k and that just isn't strat like now is it?
Another issue I ran into was that I wanted to replace the tuners and found out that the F style tuners with the excessively tall posts had 10mm bushings. My plan was to use a set of staggered Gotoh tuners to eliminate the need for strings trees and to get a useable vintage style tuner on the guitar.
I ordered adapter bushings for this conversion. I actually ordered two different styles from AllParts. They sell a generic and Gotoh branded ones. I ended up using the generic ones which were about 5$ cheaper because they fit and looked better. Plus the Gotoh ones were pretty sloppy with the tuner shaft.
The adapter bushings pressed in rather easily. However, they also pressed out easily. I made a thin bead of super glue around the bushings and pressed them into place and quickly cleaned up any excess with a gun cleaning patch. The bushings were now secure and the headstock is clean without any traces of super glue.
Had I had a super glue accident, I have some Loctite brand X-NMS solvent. However, it is pretty nasty stuff and might eat through the finish had I used it. Should you attempt this, be careful with the super glue. You do not need a lot and have something handy to clean it up quickly. Do not use your fingers. Do not use a paper towel.
This is the point that I ran into further problems. The concept of the Gotoh staggered tuner sounds great until you have them ready to go on your guitar. I had read some reviews of these tuners and it was split down the middle as to whether or not you could install them and eliminate string trees. The general consensus was that while they helped, you still needed string trees.
I would love to chime in with my personal findings on the matter, but I probably will never get that chance. The problem is that, the tallest of the staggered tuners is still considerably shorter than the standard vintage style tuner. I had a set of normal vintage style gotoh tuners on a 60's Japanese RI Telecaster to compare to.
As the tuner shafts became shorter and shorter, the tuner was barely sticking out of the headstock. Basically, they are for very thin style headstocks. I threw them back into the parts bin with the original F style tuners and opted to cannibalize the tuners off of the 60's RI. I will just order a new set in the future to replace the set I "borrowed".
I didn't bother filling in the holes from the original tuners. I probably should have as it would look a lot nicer, but I wasn't feeling particularly motivated. I placed the tuners on the guitar and lined them up with a short ruler. I marked the two outside holes and drew a line in pencil connecting them. Then I used the tuners to mark the holes and made sure each mark was on the line.
I drill out the holes with a 1/16" bit. I did this by hand although a drill press would have been ideal. I began to screw the tuners in and felt some resistance. I've unfortunately had to deal with sheared off screws in headstocks too many times in the past. I back out the screws and enlarged the holes with a 3/32" bit. Then I reinstalled the tuners using the straightedge to keep them lined up while I tightened the screws.
The tuners are pretty straight and I am sure that if I loosened them up and used the straight edge to align them again they would come out absolutely perfect. All of the tuners except one show a high resistance to turning. I don't know if this is part of the tuners or if they are binding a bit on the bushings.
Nothing feels like it is grinding or getting stuck and all tuner movement is smooth so I am not going to worry about it. The tuners hold tune as they should.
I removed the original string trees and installed a single roller string tree on the B and E strings.
I strung the guitar up and tightened up the trem claw with 4 springs until it was essentially hard tailed. I may decide to float it later. If I do, I will remove one of the springs.
The string heights were all over the place but the intonation was actually dead on without needing to adjust a single screw. I found that to be incredibly weird but convenient.
The guitar sounds great and actually has mellowed out quite a bit. Before it sounded harsh where as now it sounds more organic. I hate describing sound. I suspect a lot of the harsh sounds were coming from the zinc block, diecast saddles, and poor string angle at the nut.
My only complaint with the bridge is that it is a HAIR...and I meant a tiny bit wider string spacing than the original bridge. The high E is sitting at a slight angle on the saddle. I am not worried about it and everything plays fine, but upon close inspection it is plainly visible.
I feel really good about the upgrades and am glad I waited for the right parts to do it correctly. Nothing is worse than having to do the same job multiple times because it wasn't done right.
Now it is time to play and enjoy it!
