FU-Tone's Hardware Guitar Upgrades
From brass blocks and claws to titanium posts, saddle inserts and screws, FU-Tone will make your six-string roar. To demonstrate just how easily and quickly FU-Tone can refresh your six-string, Guitar World Tech Editor Paul Riario sat down with FU-Tone founder Adam Reiver to add upgrades to a Jackson Pro Series Dinky.
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MusicTranscript
00:00Hey, what's up? It's Paul from Guitar World, and today is an exciting day because I have
00:09Adam Reaver here from FUTone, and we are going to take this Jackson Pro Series Dinky in this
00:17awesome almost glow-in-the-dark green, but that's not the point. The thing is, we're
00:22going to take this guitar and turn it from ordinary to extraordinary by adding a whole
00:27bunch of upgrades on this guitar. You'll get to hear what it sounds like before and
00:32after, you know, Adam works on it. So, let's take a listen to the guitar now pre-upgrade.
00:40I'll start here on the clean channel, just to give you a couple sounds from the selector
00:45switch, and then we'll move over to a more dirtier setting so you can hear that as well
00:49pre-upgrade. Here we go.
01:19Pre-upgrade.
01:49Pre-upgrade.
02:19Pre-upgrade.
02:28What are the things that we will do?
02:30Upgrade the key components of the bridge, starting with the block underneath the bridge,
02:36the saddle inserts, we'll do all the hardware, the string lock screws, the saddle mounting
02:41screws, the nut clamping screws, we'll change the springs, the heavy-duty noiseless springs,
02:46and we'll do the claw and brass as well.
02:50And did you also mention that we might do the tremolo stopper as well?
02:54Trem stopper.
02:55Trem stopper, okay.
02:56So, obviously an option for this, this bridge floats, but we're going to set it for dive
03:01only. Trem stopper makes it more stable for tuning, you can rest your hand on the bridge
03:06when you play, and it has a huge tonal benefit by making direct contact to the block right
03:11into the body, just even more resonance hitting the wood.
03:14Yeah, I've always noticed that too, as well, I actually have the trem stopper on some of
03:19my guitars, just for that point that it just adds so much to the overall tone.
03:24So Adam, now that we have the guitar on the bench, take me through how you will start,
03:28or where you will start here, and what you'll do.
03:30Basically, I'll remove the strings, I'll remove the springs, take the bridge out, rebuild
03:36the bridge, upgrade the block, the inserts, all the screws, the posts, springs, and claw,
03:42drop the bridge back in, re-intonate it, and set it up, get it ready to go.
03:48There's full step-by-step instructions on how to do this on FU, and it doesn't take
03:52very long at all.
03:53Yeah, it's rather quick, and probably under an hour, in some cases under half an hour.
03:58Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.
04:00And I think an important point that you want to point out is the fact that the parts that
04:04you are putting on here match the color of this guitar.
04:08That's bonus.
04:09That's a bonus.
04:10That's a complete bonus.
04:12Green, titanium.
04:13Green, titanium, right, but just so everyone else knows the fact that, depending on the
04:17color of your guitar, or even your hardware, you have every color under the rainbow.
04:23Options, so in titanium.
04:25So all the basic screws, string lock, saddle mount, nut clamp, instead of steel, we do
04:30them in titanium.
04:31I even do them in black titanium.
04:33So if you want it to look the same, black titanium, silver, red, blue, green, purple,
04:39white, I mean, tons of colors, and they sound better, they function better, and that's the
04:45point of titanium.
04:46Yeah, pretty much if you want to make the guitar pop just in looks alone, you got them
04:50covered.
04:51Bonus.
04:52Total bonus for the looks.
04:53All right, well, let's get to it.
04:54Let's go.
05:09And we're back.
05:21Here we are.
05:22Adam has installed all these upgrades and has turned this Jackson into a beast.
05:27So as you can see, it's just, it looks incredible.
05:32And of course, the one thing that we noticed before, which we didn't do, but the great
05:39thing about it is that even acoustically, the guitar sounds louder and more present.
05:43Like it just has a different sort of ring to it, right?
05:50It's just open sounding right now.
05:53So with that, let's say we take a listen.
05:57See what it sounds like, right?
06:15That's loud.
06:16I love the look on your face when you do that.
06:18It's like, wow.
06:19But you can hear it, it's just louder.
06:22It's got a little more, a little more resonance to it, right?
06:52It's just powerful.
07:00Just powerful.
07:01Wow.
07:02And now, let's see when we get to some gain.
07:16So I can hear that mid-range.
07:18Just cut it.
07:19It's like a slice.
07:50Yeah.
08:03Happy?
08:04It's incredible.
08:05It's incredible.
08:06Listen to that.
08:07Yeah.
08:10It's a huge improvement.
08:15So Adam, I want to quickly run down each of the parts, and you can quickly explain that
08:21to me.
08:22How about we do that?
08:23Quick.
08:24Okay.
08:25No problem.
08:26Right here are the posts.
08:27We did green titanium.
08:28So all the green parts we added are titanium.
08:29So the posts, one, two, green titanium.
08:33The saddle inserts, the little blocks inside the saddles that pinch the string, green titanium.
08:39Saddle mounting screws.
08:42String lock screws.
08:43Up at the top, we have the nut clamping screws.
08:48And then in the back, under the hood, we were able to go up to a 37 millimeter brass big
08:54block.
08:55We've got the heavy duty noiseless green springs.
08:59Brass tremolo stopper.
09:01Brass claw.
09:02Brass claw screws.
09:04And you find that between having all the brass here, it just totally adds to the overall
09:08like tonal equation?
09:11Brass increases the vibration.
09:14It amplifies the vibration.
09:15So when the string rings, it goes through your saddle, hits the bridge.
09:19That piece of brass rings like a bell and just pushes it back out into the guitar.
09:25You're not hearing the brass.
09:26You're just hearing more of the guitar.
09:28Gotcha.
09:29So we're just pushing the vibration out.
09:31And with the noiseless springs, now, the idea, of course, is that you hear a lot of that?
09:36Yeah.
09:37So if you were to take any guitar with regular springs in it and muffle the strings and just
09:42do like a chunk, acoustically, chunk, you would hear the springs reverb like a reverb
09:48tank.
09:49You put your ear on the guitar.
09:51That sound's going through your sound the whole time.
09:54It's dirt in your sound.
09:56So this takes a lot of that dirt away.
09:59Interesting.
10:00Awesome.
10:01And there you have it.
10:02That's a good run through and understanding how each thing works here.
10:06All there, really, just make this guitar play like a dream and sound like a dream.
10:30Well, there you go.
10:31Enough said, right?
10:32You have such guitar face.
10:33And I love that because that's what happens.
10:36If you could do anything for your tremolo-equipped guitar, it's doing it like this.
10:40And it's just incredible.
10:41Thanks, man.
10:42Yeah.
10:43To accomplish all this, where do I go again?
10:45Simple.
10:46fu-tone.com.
10:49And I'll find all those parts here.
10:51And they're all affordable.
10:52Yes.
10:53So, F-U Tone.
10:56Guitar World.
10:57Guitar World.
10:58Oh, thank you.
10:59You know what's up.
11:00That's right.
11:01Definitely check this out.
11:05It's like popping wheelies.
11:28I know, right?
11:29It's just like.
11:30I always get that.
11:32Yeah.
11:33So cool.
11:34Fun.
11:35Yeah, you get all that.
11:36They're all popping out.
11:37It's awesome.