Setting up a strat tremolo bridge

[Swedey the cat]

Sorry if this has been covered before but does anyone know of a good site to show how to set up a strat trem bridge?

Being a tele and les paul man before now ive not had to deal with this sort of 'fine adjustments'!! :lol:  :(

I currently have it in tune but the gap between the bridge and the body is huge about 5mm!! :(

Ive taken the back off and had a lok but rather than play blindly with it i'd like to know how its done proper.

Ideally i'd like a couple of mm gap maximum.

Cheers one and all

[Antag]

What's the action like at the moment?  The bridge should be adjusted to get the strings the correct height above the frets (of course, the trussrod & saddles play a part in this too)

Just winding the bridge down so that it looks OK on the body might bring the strings right down onto the frets & give you problems with buzzing or if it's as much as you imply even make the guitar unplayable....

Also, is it the vintage 6 hole trem or the modern 2-post trem?

[FELINEGUITARS]

I assume that you mean the gap at the back of the bridge is too high - so you would have massive pull up on the trem

To adjust this you tighten the two screws holding the claw attached to the springs on the back.
Tighten it a little (quarter to a half turn at a time) and then retune . if still too high then repeat.

DO not touch the six/two mounting screws (do not tighten them down) - the wrong way to do it to get the trem to sit lower

[Swedey the cat]

Thats the way i was going to do it but wanted to check 1st.
Its a new guitar so new strings and they had detuned i suppose by stretching and its only when i tuned them i got this huge gap.
So is that right detune then adjust the two screws then retune and repeat til i get about 2mm.

Thanks for your help its much appreciated being as i am a trem virgin!!

[FELINEGUITARS]

No need to detune
Adjust springs with strings at pitch , then re-tune as strings will go sharp and do it again if needed