Apart from the block length, there is a lot hot wind in this review. The critique of 'over engineering' mentioned around the 9 minute mark, show that you may have missed the point of Babicz. This is the part that allows full contact and retains individual string height adjustment.
As I mentioned before: with full contact you will lose more than if you had two pins ( fender style) or even one pin hypothetically, because with "full contact" your sound will be spread and lost on the bottom surface of your saddle, whereas on fender style it is concentrated and transmitted in full spectrum of it's frequencies thru those pins. It's actually physics.
@@MusicHelper911 And you clearly don't know the physics! Look at many decoupling devices which use a mass coming to a point to decouple the speaker from the substrate. Why? Because, this stops additional elevation of unwanted frequencies from entering the ears of the listener. In this case, the frequency elevation obtained by exciting the different resonant frequencies of the wood is a desired effect (if the guitar is built right). Standard saddles actually cause decoupling. Different materials have different resonant frequencies and acoustic impedances. There is not a single material in any shape or size that "transmits frequencies in full spectrum." Full contact being spread is exactly how the bridge interacts with the sound board (the top) of an acoustic guitar. It's actually physics.
The professional way to adjust your bridge and intonation is the T-R-A-I-N method. Tune the guitar; Check the Relief of the neck; Adjust the string height: set the Intonation; and Noodle around with your guitar to see if you like the setup. Obviously, different gauge strings will usually require different settings. I have a Japanese Aerodyne Strat with a Babicz and it is excellent. Extremely comfortable, smooth and very high quality. Way better than the stamped steel saddles and of course, the Japanese craftsmanship is incredible
It may be "over engineered" but this Babicz bridge sounds amazing and can be set up so it stays in tune even when using the whammy bar. I love mine. Take some getting used to.
I went through something similar. I found out that genuine Fender Strat bodies are wider than modern Fender Squire bodies and a lot of after market bodies. The longer block is not an oversight. It works fine in a genuine Fender body which it was designed for. But this trem does seem over-engineered. Eventually the change in scale length will be overcome when you intonate the strings. But you'll need to do that every time you change string height. Fortunately we don't do that so often once it's set. I didn't buy one of these, I bought a Mann Made trem - John Mann has the patent on the PRS trem and what I bought was similar to a PRS trem. The Mann Made trem is almost twice what the Babicz Trem costs, but I'm so happy with what I got I would do it again. But you'd have a problem with the longer block in those, too. And it only came with three springs. I put a fourth on and immediately took it off. Not all springs are equal.
Never heard of that Mann Made trem but checked them out and they look really nice with what looks like a very tight fit between saddles inside that base plate pocket. Will definitely try it on my next built.
I never change guage. so i dont have a problem with intonation but i see what he is saying. But changing string ga is a pain with any trem because it changes the spring tensions. Life with tremssss, pain in the ass!
i have 3 of them .no problems. yes on a aftermarket chinese body Strat it did stick out 2mm like he said, I just left the cover off. Five springs is too much, thats why they give you three. The full contact bridge saddles are great. One screw is for spinning the bridge saddle around to set height, and one is for snugging down to lock it in place. Yes the allen screws are at different angles. so what, they have different functions. How often do you reset your action? Never for me. All trems are a compromise.
I’ve had a full contact on my strat for two years and I over tightened the screw to the cam and it put a divot in the cam. Now it no longer sits right and the whole thing comes outa tune as soon as I touch the trim bar.
I'm not a fan of Babicz bridges. Especially for a Strat. A Fender bridge allows saddle height adjustment without the need for the cam. A Gibson tune-o-matic doesn't have individual saddle height adjustment so maybe a Babicz is an improvement. Maybe not. I bought an SG with a Babicz and immediately removed it, put the TOM back on, and sold the Babicz. I recently bought a MIM Strat that has a Babicz. It was cheap. I don't like the bridge, but a replacement Wilkinson or Callaham is not cheap. So I'm kind of stuck with the Babicz for now. Thanx for the vid. Over engineered is a good explanation. Maybe I just need to get used to it. Do you float these like any other 6 point Fender trem?
I have a Babicz replacement bridge in place of a Gibson Tunomatic bridge & it's many times better! I now consider Tunomatics to be relatively crappy & long overdue for a redesign. I used to use Graphtech saddles &, once I'd set the guitar up properly, Super Glue the little F*****s into place, that glueing made a very significant difference to sound & tuning stability. Personally I'd much rather have something/anything over engineered any day. I find nearly everything manufactured today is under engineered to the point of being intentionally deposable. I didn't understand why you had to explain that adjusting the hight of the string will affect the intonation, that is true of any bridge. With the Babicz bridge when you lower the string it moves slightly closer to the nut & visa-versa which means you have to make less intonation saddle adjustment than a standard bridge. And, depending on the gauge of strings & amount of string hight change an adjustment to move the saddle forward or back might not even be necessary. All the pieces lock/don't move which I really like. I have a design detail that would (not so humbly) make but, I think it's engineered proportionally very well. A correctly sized tremolo block would be good, I'll grant you that!
thanks for your opinion. While strat tremolos might have some room for improvement ( definitely not what Babicz offered in my opinion), TOM I strongly believe is perfectly engineered simple system and having more than a few LPs I never felt the need for something different, especially Babicz for LP. From the first look of it - strings sit too deep, so no way you can get that palm mute for heavy style playing. Second - too many pieces, so there is not way even in theory that this bridge would give you more sustain or sound or whatever they advertise. Unless they do a test with graphics and show me the improvements. But sometimes you do not have to have it to understand how things work, just logic and some knowledge. They have a nice shine though. The only improvement Gibson TOM might need is probably 2 screws on each side ( tone pros style) that would hold them in place when there are no strings. So if you like it - kudos to you. I know I don't and I'd never recommend it to anyone. It's a free world. Thanks.
Just a word of caution, if you don't know, don't make videos. If you need more than 3 springs maybe you should buy a baritone or play a hardtail. As far as raising or lowering the strings changing intonation, almost every bridge does the same thing. A radius rotating from a fixed point is exactly the concept of almost every tremolo system to set string height. The only difference is Babicz uses a shorter radius. Babicz is solving the lack of saddle to bridge plate contact seen with traditional saddles. Now, whether that makes a difference is a big physics argument. It is very common to grind down or change the length of tremelo blocks especially, on non OEM bodies. If you can't be objective and honest in reviews you should not do them.
Well you ain’t floating it with 5 springs and it is designed to float. Plus your Strat already has 5 springs how many do you need? Stupid complaint IMHO.
Well, don't want to be rude, but this review actually almost annoyed me. What did you state? "Overengineered?" "Why would you go through the pain.. of blah blah?" Dear fellow guitarist, the sole purpose of "overengineering" is to make a totally different, unique bridge, where saddles have almost a FULL CONTACT with the plate. And the way you adjust the mechanism of the famous patented eCAM saddle is exactly as complicated, as it needs to be, in order to achieve the better contact through the bottom of the saddle - not through tiny height screws, as originally put in strat bridges. Don't get me wrong - those tiny, annoying screws contribute to the fantastic strat sound as well - but there is always room to improve 70 year old, cheap design. And some American guy, named Jeff Babicz spent many years of his life inventing this remarkable upgrade, yet you say it is overengineered. Gosh, come on!!! That was the aim - to engineer something totally different and improving upon the original design. As for block height, I can assure you it fits regular Fender body, and thinking this could be the oversight is just silly. Would you really think, that inventor of unique guitars and gear with 40 years of experience in the market would forget about how thick the strat bodies are? :)) And the difference in string length due to cam rotation? Come on, it's nothing that you cannot compensate while doing regular intonation check and adjustment! Which comes _after_ you adjust the string height. And I wonder, what your conclusions were, after upgrading. Most of users see notable improvement on sustain and note ringing, after the change, either with cheaper Z-series you tested, or the full-blown regular Babicz bridges. Hope you at least would _hear_ the difference. Peace!
First - not rude at all and I really appreciate your comment and the fact that you trying to state clear arguments. As per your respond - you say FULL contact. Well, there is one thing everybody should know, and that's basic physics - to transmit a signal from one surface to another you do not need a full contact, I'd even say, you absolutely do not need a full contact, it would even be enough to have one pin between one metal part and another one to transmit sound and the quality of the signal will not be worse and you will not lose any of your frequencies. In fact, with full contact you will lose more than if you had two pins ( fender style) or even one pin hypothetically, because with "full contact" your sound will be spread and lost on the bottom surface of you saddle, whereas on fender style it is concentrated and transmitted in full spectrum of it's frequencies thru those pins. Of course, if you had string diameter close to the boat ropes, than yes, your point might've been relevant. but in case of strings - you will lose more on "full contact", unless that full contact is welded to the plate. As an experiment try to hold a piece of steel blade with needle point pliers and hit it with a hard object, you'll hear clear ding-dong-ring-a-bell ( given that the steel is of a decent quality), and then try to hold the same blade between two rather large pieces of steel and hit it - you'll hear just a dull muted sound. It's all physics. On top of that, that cylinder is made of an absolutely dull and musically dead piece of aluminum, and most of the sound is pretty much killed right there ( make it brass, or steel and we might ( MIGHT) have an argument). Of course there are not too many people who'd hear the difference, but if one applies the logic of the high school physics he'll know where the truth is. So like I said, I didn't even install it - sometimes you do not have to do something to know the outcome, you just have to know a bit of a science. Regarding those who hears the difference - do not trust random people, trust professionals and trusted sound engineers, and I've never seen them using those systems. It's just a shiny object to please the eye of mass consumer. It's like that amp SPARK40 - you play it alone in the comfort of your home and it sounds great, but two days ago I got to jam with two guys with 10W regular combos and that spark40 was lost completely no matter how loud I tried to make it. Some things are proven by time...and , of course by basic knowledge of physics ( apologies for using that word quite frequently)
![The Perfect Stratocaster Trem / Vibrato Setup [Floating, Flat Or Blocked?]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/PjVXWyUGpwc/mqdefault.jpg)
![The Perfect Stratocaster Trem / Vibrato Setup [Floating, Flat Or Blocked?]](/img/tr.png)
This is a “fully” adjustable bridge ! Show me another ! It’s freakin awesome. And it also serves as a roller bridge for bigsbys….
Apart from the block length, there is a lot hot wind in this review. The critique of 'over engineering' mentioned around the 9 minute mark, show that you may have missed the point of Babicz. This is the part that allows full contact and retains individual string height adjustment.
As I mentioned before:
with full contact you will lose more than if you had two pins ( fender style) or even one pin hypothetically, because with "full contact" your sound will be spread and lost on the bottom surface of your saddle, whereas on fender style it is concentrated and transmitted in full spectrum of it's frequencies thru those pins. It's actually physics.
@@MusicHelper911 And you clearly don't know the physics! Look at many decoupling devices which use a mass coming to a point to decouple the speaker from the substrate. Why? Because, this stops additional elevation of unwanted frequencies from entering the ears of the listener. In this case, the frequency elevation obtained by exciting the different resonant frequencies of the wood is a desired effect (if the guitar is built right). Standard saddles actually cause decoupling. Different materials have different resonant frequencies and acoustic impedances. There is not a single material in any shape or size that "transmits frequencies in full spectrum." Full contact being spread is exactly how the bridge interacts with the sound board (the top) of an acoustic guitar. It's actually physics.
And if you change the height on a 1950s strat tremolo saddle, you ALSO throw the intonation off.
The professional way to adjust your bridge and intonation is the T-R-A-I-N method. Tune the guitar; Check the Relief of the neck; Adjust the string height: set the Intonation; and Noodle around with your guitar to see if you like the setup. Obviously, different gauge strings will usually require different settings. I have a Japanese Aerodyne Strat with a Babicz and it is excellent. Extremely comfortable, smooth and very high quality. Way better than the stamped steel saddles and of course, the Japanese craftsmanship is incredible
It may be "over engineered" but this Babicz bridge sounds amazing and can be set up so it stays in tune even when using the whammy bar. I love mine. Take some getting used to.
I like the PRS style screws. No offense no one gives you 5 springs.
Yup...not anymore...
I went through something similar. I found out that genuine Fender Strat bodies are wider than modern Fender Squire bodies and a lot of after market bodies. The longer block is not an oversight. It works fine in a genuine Fender body which it was designed for. But this trem does seem over-engineered. Eventually the change in scale length will be overcome when you intonate the strings. But you'll need to do that every time you change string height. Fortunately we don't do that so often once it's set.
I didn't buy one of these, I bought a Mann Made trem - John Mann has the patent on the PRS trem and what I bought was similar to a PRS trem. The Mann Made trem is almost twice what the Babicz Trem costs, but I'm so happy with what I got I would do it again. But you'd have a problem with the longer block in those, too. And it only came with three springs. I put a fourth on and immediately took it off. Not all springs are equal.
Never heard of that Mann Made trem but checked them out and they look really nice with what looks like a very tight fit between saddles inside that base plate pocket. Will definitely try it on my next built.
I never change guage. so i dont have a problem with intonation but i see what he is saying. But changing string ga is a pain with any trem because it changes the spring tensions. Life with tremssss, pain in the ass!
i have 3 of them .no problems. yes on a aftermarket chinese body Strat it did stick out 2mm like he said, I just left the cover off. Five springs is too much, thats why they give you three. The full contact bridge saddles are great. One screw is for spinning the bridge saddle around to set height, and one is for snugging down to lock it in place. Yes the allen screws are at different angles. so what, they have different functions. How often do you reset your action? Never for me. All trems are a compromise.
So. You set your action height and then your intonation. Not sure what the problem is… why would you want to keep adjusting your action?
I’ve had a full contact on my strat for two years and I over tightened the screw to the cam and it put a divot in the cam. Now it no longer sits right and the whole thing comes outa tune as soon as I touch the trim bar.
I just bought one of these tremolos. I'm making my own build. Hopefully it turns out well.
Building your own guitar is the most fun. Good luck to you.
I'm not a fan of Babicz bridges. Especially for a Strat. A Fender bridge allows saddle height adjustment without the need for the cam. A Gibson tune-o-matic doesn't have individual saddle height adjustment so maybe a Babicz is an improvement. Maybe not. I bought an SG with a Babicz and immediately removed it, put the TOM back on, and sold the Babicz. I recently bought a MIM Strat that has a Babicz. It was cheap. I don't like the bridge, but a replacement Wilkinson or Callaham is not cheap. So I'm kind of stuck with the Babicz for now. Thanx for the vid. Over engineered is a good explanation. Maybe I just need to get used to it.
Do you float these like any other 6 point Fender trem?
I have a Babicz replacement bridge in place of a Gibson Tunomatic bridge & it's many times better! I now consider Tunomatics to be relatively crappy & long overdue for a redesign. I used to use Graphtech saddles &, once I'd set the guitar up properly, Super Glue the little F*****s into place, that glueing made a very significant difference to sound & tuning stability. Personally I'd much rather have something/anything over engineered any day. I find nearly everything manufactured today is under engineered to the point of being intentionally deposable. I didn't understand why you had to explain that adjusting the hight of the string will affect the intonation, that is true of any bridge. With the Babicz bridge when you lower the string it moves slightly closer to the nut & visa-versa which means you have to make less intonation saddle adjustment than a standard bridge. And, depending on the gauge of strings & amount of string hight change an adjustment to move the saddle forward or back might not even be necessary. All the pieces lock/don't move which I really like. I have a design detail that would (not so humbly) make but, I think it's engineered proportionally very well. A correctly sized tremolo block would be good, I'll grant you that!
thanks for your opinion. While strat tremolos might have some room for improvement ( definitely not what Babicz offered in my opinion), TOM I strongly believe is perfectly engineered simple system and having more than a few LPs I never felt the need for something different, especially Babicz for LP. From the first look of it - strings sit too deep, so no way you can get that palm mute for heavy style playing. Second - too many pieces, so there is not way even in theory that this bridge would give you more sustain or sound or whatever they advertise. Unless they do a test with graphics and show me the improvements. But sometimes you do not have to have it to understand how things work, just logic and some knowledge. They have a nice shine though.
The only improvement Gibson TOM might need is probably 2 screws on each side ( tone pros style) that would hold them in place when there are no strings.
So if you like it - kudos to you. I know I don't and I'd never recommend it to anyone. It's a free world. Thanks.
If you don’t want it, can you send it to me. Plz.
I have never used more than three usually only two.
Just a word of caution, if you don't know, don't make videos. If you need more than 3 springs maybe you should buy a baritone or play a hardtail. As far as raising or lowering the strings changing intonation, almost every bridge does the same thing. A radius rotating from a fixed point is exactly the concept of almost every tremolo system to set string height. The only difference is Babicz uses a shorter radius. Babicz is solving the lack of saddle to bridge plate contact seen with traditional saddles. Now, whether that makes a difference is a big physics argument. It is very common to grind down or change the length of tremelo blocks especially, on non OEM bodies. If you can't be objective and honest in reviews you should not do them.
Well you ain’t floating it with 5 springs and it is designed to float. Plus your Strat already has 5 springs how many do you need? Stupid complaint IMHO.
It's not a complaint. Merely an observation.
Well, don't want to be rude, but this review actually almost annoyed me. What did you state? "Overengineered?" "Why would you go through the pain.. of blah blah?"
Dear fellow guitarist, the sole purpose of "overengineering" is to make a totally different, unique bridge, where saddles have almost a FULL CONTACT with the plate. And the way you adjust the mechanism of the famous patented eCAM saddle is exactly as complicated, as it needs to be, in order to achieve the better contact through the bottom of the saddle - not through tiny height screws, as originally put in strat bridges. Don't get me wrong - those tiny, annoying screws contribute to the fantastic strat sound as well - but there is always room to improve 70 year old, cheap design. And some American guy, named Jeff Babicz spent many years of his life inventing this remarkable upgrade, yet you say it is overengineered. Gosh, come on!!! That was the aim - to engineer something totally different and improving upon the original design.
As for block height, I can assure you it fits regular Fender body, and thinking this could be the oversight is just silly. Would you really think, that inventor of unique guitars and gear with 40 years of experience in the market would forget about how thick the strat bodies are? :))
And the difference in string length due to cam rotation? Come on, it's nothing that you cannot compensate while doing regular intonation check and adjustment! Which comes _after_ you adjust the string height.
And I wonder, what your conclusions were, after upgrading. Most of users see notable improvement on sustain and note ringing, after the change, either with cheaper Z-series you tested, or the full-blown regular Babicz bridges. Hope you at least would _hear_ the difference. Peace!
First - not rude at all and I really appreciate your comment and the fact that you trying to state clear arguments.
As per your respond - you say FULL contact. Well, there is one thing everybody should know, and that's basic physics - to transmit a signal from one surface to another you do not need a full contact, I'd even say, you absolutely do not need a full contact, it would even be enough to have one pin between one metal part and another one to transmit sound and the quality of the signal will not be worse and you will not lose any of your frequencies. In fact, with full contact you will lose more than if you had two pins ( fender style) or even one pin hypothetically, because with "full contact" your sound will be spread and lost on the bottom surface of you saddle, whereas on fender style it is concentrated and transmitted in full spectrum of it's frequencies thru those pins.
Of course, if you had string diameter close to the boat ropes, than yes, your point might've been relevant. but in case of strings - you will lose more on "full contact", unless that full contact is welded to the plate. As an experiment try to hold a piece of steel blade with needle point pliers and hit it with a hard object, you'll hear clear ding-dong-ring-a-bell ( given that the steel is of a decent quality), and then try to hold the same blade between two rather large pieces of steel and hit it - you'll hear just a dull muted sound. It's all physics.
On top of that, that cylinder is made of an absolutely dull and musically dead piece of aluminum, and most of the sound is pretty much killed right there ( make it brass, or steel and we might ( MIGHT) have an argument).
Of course there are not too many people who'd hear the difference, but if one applies the logic of the high school physics he'll know where the truth is.
So like I said, I didn't even install it - sometimes you do not have to do something to know the outcome, you just have to know a bit of a science. Regarding those who hears the difference - do not trust random people, trust professionals and trusted sound engineers, and I've never seen them using those systems. It's just a shiny object to please the eye of mass consumer. It's like that amp SPARK40 - you play it alone in the comfort of your home and it sounds great, but two days ago I got to jam with two guys with 10W regular combos and that spark40 was lost completely no matter how loud I tried to make it. Some things are proven by time...and , of course by basic knowledge of physics ( apologies for using that word quite frequently)
@@MusicHelper911 you didn't install it? I'll buy it off you.
@@ericsanders5357 shipped it back the moment i was done with this review. It’s just not my cup of tea. Callaham did it for me.
Who is this guy, I put one in a fender mix strat with no problem.
OK, but which (vintage) vibrato for a strat is the best one in your opinion...?
Callaham I'd say. Gotoh also is very good quality in my opinion.
I would say that the tremolo sticking out is your body is too thin. You have a Custom Made Body and not to industry standards. NEXT
..how many players use 5 springs? I can think of one,..Cory Wong-and it might just be 4 now that I think about it.
Well, it’s kinda not the point. In my 40 years of driving I’ve never used a spare. Doesn’t mean they shouldn’t include it.
less complaining would be nice. remove the block and add the original one.. big deal. or buy an actual strat body that fits it..
Your right!! Friggin IDIOTIC COMPANY