Help on this guitar

[Anthony]

My friend Jon gave me this guitar.
It’s a Fender Stratocaster, made in Japan.
Serial #E535098
Metallic Red, with white pick guard.

What do the six knobs down at the bottom here do:
[img]http://www.freesofree.net/images/fender_1.jpg[/img]

and what does this allen-wrench thing at the top do?
[img]http://www.freesofree.net/images/fender_2.jpg[/img]

Can anyone say what year the guitar is made?

[malkmus]

http://www.fender.com/support/dating/japanese_dating.php”>http://www.fender.com/support/dating/ja … dating.php

DATING JAPANESE MADE FENDER INSTRUMENTS
SERIAL NUMBERS CIRCA
E + 6 DIGITS 1984-1987

Maybe?

[alicemudgarden_jr]

I think the allen wrench is a tuning lock so ur guitar never goes out of tune, those 6 little nobs should alter the tuning of each string but only a limited amount. So you should unlock the tuning lock on the neck and get the guitar in tune then tighten them up, then if u have to make any adjustments use those 6 nobs to get it perfectly in tune. I’ve never seen them on a strat before though

[lookitssam]

The knobs on the bridge should adjust the intonation.

The thing at the top is a lock so it doesn’t go out of tune as easily.

[Anthony]

"alicemudgarden_jr " wrote:

I’ve never seen them on a strat before though

thanks a lot. So you think that the top and bottom are not original pieces?

He also gave me a Fender Sidekick 15 mini amp, and a Fender hard plastic black guitar case.

[alicemudgarden_jr]

I don’t know to be honest, i’ve only ever seen them on Ibanez’s and those types of guitars, but from the photo it looks like it’s made by fender so my guess would be that they’re original. Has anybody seen a fender with tuning lock before? It just seemed alittle strange to me, you should ask your friend.

I’d like to meet Jon he sounds like a great guy, is there anything else he’s giving away

[Randy Jane]

Yeah, it’s a locking nut and a single locking bridge. My black strat had one of those setups on it but then it was switched over to a really old Floyd Rose single locking bridge that doesn’t need a locking nut, I like it. My Floyd does not have those little thumb screws on them though, which is why there is no locking nut. I would like to get a nut like that, so if you ever decide to go with a different system let me know.

RJ.

[RSTguitars]

That is original equipment… some of the Japanese Strats made around 1984-1985 had that tremolo and locking nut.  I believe the USA "Elite" series also had them.

[tonas]

Have fun tuning it, I hate those locking tremelos. Still pretty cool getting a free guitar though.

[RSTguitars]

The tremelo (I think Fender called it the "Freeflyte") isn’t bad, but I would recommend getting rid of the locking nut and replacing the tuners with some Sperzel locking tuners.  That will make your life a lot easier.

[Anthony]

thanks for all the input.
After having the guitar for a couple days now, I can say that I don’t like that ‘tuning lock’ one bit.
It is a pain to loosen it, tune the guitar, tighten it back up, then fine adjust with the knobs.

If I remove the tuning lock, tighten those knobs all the way down, then tune the guitar, will that be ok ?
I also don’t want to destroy the guitar by removing the tuning locks, so is it wise for me to remove them ?

[Anthony]

I found this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tremolo_arm#Locking_tremolo”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tremolo_ar … ng_tremolo and it’s really helping me out.

[Colin]

My strat has the little knobs on the bottom, but not the tuning lock (I don’t think I’d want one since I change tuning so often). Of course, mine is an 83′ custom, so there’s a lot of different things on it.

[Anthony]

I figured this thing out, and I don’t mind the tuning lock anymore. I think it’s actually quite cool and unique now.
I didn’t know anything about this kind of bridge or anything, and when I took the old strings off and put new strings on, it would not tune. The floating bridge was also flat against the guitar, when I know I’ve seen it floating with the old strings on. I found this web page showing how to tune a floyd rose, and learned that with new strings, you need to tune from low to high, over and over again, multiple, multiple times. It took me 10-15 rounds of tuning to finally get it. With each pass, the strings become tigher and tigher, and the bridge slowly moves up into balance. Once you can go from low to high, and they’re still in tune, you lock down the nuts on the lock and fine tune with the 6 knobs on the bottom. Right now, it’s perfectly in tune with a standard tuning. I used the tremolo bar last night, going both up and down with it, and it’s really cool.

here’s some links I used:
http://www.imuso.co.uk/directory/guitar-lessons/floyd-rose-trem.htm”>http://www.imuso.co.uk/directory/guitar … e-trem.htm
http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/onlinetuner.html”>http://www.guitarforbeginners.com/onlinetuner.html

[jebus_the_llama]

thats a kahler(i thhink?) locking tremelo, and somesortof locking nut, not big on those two things so im not two sure of what brand they are….hopes that helps!

[Author]

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