Hello. New member here. Floyd/Kahler hybid no-name NOS jap bass trem.

Hello basstremfanatics.

First up many thanks to Eric Haven for making this sight possible.

Names Daniel from Sydney and i'm a long time lurker/first time poster. I'm into basses and hard to find parts.

Dream bass would (and will be) a kahlered reverse head-stock B.C Rich Ironbird.

I won this https://www.jauce.com/auction/f138316247 (hope the link works) but know nothing about it except that it reeks of quality. I have pretty much scoured here trying to find anything relating to it but have come up empty handed. There are no markings/brandings/instructions whatsoever on what it is or how to install it.

If anybody knows anything or even nothing, please don't hesitate to speak up.

Pictures are large and lots.

anyway...

















This Hondo H1 "death dagger" is my only trem'd up bass at the moment...




The one with the script logo actually arrived with the aforementioned tremolo...







These Hondo fame series 871's are the rarest and my faves...





This is just sheer madness...


anyway, thanks guys and i hope i haven't overstepped the boundaries here.

Cheers and later 

Hey dvassafor6!
Afraid I can't give any help with that awesome looking trem (Eric or MadMike can probably give you some insight) but just wanting to say welcome and that is a awesome collection of basses and guitars you have!

Hey thanks Alexander mate for the welcome. they're not the most renown brands/models but every one of them was a scrap to win and they have been set up really well.

Cheers  

Greetings, Daniel! Welcome to BTF!   

MAN! I could use the word "envy" to describe how I feel about your bass collection, not to mention your amazing score on that rare bass trem....but somehow, it wouldn't be strong enough of a word to use! LOL!   

You have some really killer basses there! Definitely a metal heart, you have!

OK, as far as the trem goes, my best guess would be that this must be the concoction of an extremely gifted metal worker who took the Kahler design to another level. Part of the reason I think this might be so is that it appears that the springs are actually Kahler springs. Also, the cam system, which is another Kahler trademark. And the arm looks like a long Kahler arm.

But then, you have the fine tuners. These parts look like they were finely crafted, and expertly chromed.

The roller bridge is obviously not a Kahler design.

And then you have the toplock. I have only seen one production bass toplock, which was made by ABM several years ago, and has been since discontinued. This one looks like it might be a custom design, not unlike the one I have on my four-stringer.

My guess is that our little group will probably not have any new information on this particular unit, because it would have been discussed already. Still, of anyone here knows anything about this mystery bass trem, please chime in.

Again, thank you for sharing this, Daniel! PLEASE give us a full report once you get it up and running! Can't wait to hear the feedback!

Cheers!  

I like this guy, not a normal **** looking p-bass in his whole collections  

Hey thanks Eric & Amimbari for your kind comments. if i do ever install this trem i will defiantly post a few pics on here. most possible scenario is that this site/you guys will probably help me along the way unless i come across any kind of instructions for the anomaly.

Tah blokes...

Man, long time since I checked the forum. Welcome!

To me it seems to be that Eric is right with the skilled metalworker imitating a Kahler design remark.

I was wondering how the finetuning mechanism works. I also noticed the notches behind the mounting posts for the springs, does this mean that the mounting posts of the strings can be moved? Just being curious   

Great questions, Jim!   

hey guys. havent been here in forever. i do most my social networking on my phone and this site isnt working in my browser and neither is the app ... it wont let me sign in ... nor does the forum maintain this format like it does on my computer. i dont like it ... not one bit. i am currently trying to take over, occupy and overthrow everything else in life that i dont like and i thought that eventually i would get to this, but things havent gone as planned. its a lot of work, the list is long and the competition and resistance is not budging.

  

but for now, i can surrender, get on the old fashioned pc chisel and tablet and communicate with my peeps.

dvassafor6 ... welcome to the forum.

yes, that does look like someone with some machine shop skills was getting crafty. i would guess, by those string locking, screw down stop piece doo dads where the ball end of the string goes were originally from a BACH bass trem. someone probably discovered the same thing about that trem that i did ... its crapola ... and tried to swipe things from it that mighta been useful.

the BACH Music bass trem came stock on some of the Washburn Bantam basses. that bass is now discontinued. being obsessive (who me?) i needed one (and wifey still disagrees with whatever when i make that statement). i drove to new jersey (ew) and bought one for waaaaaay too much money. the slop in the trem mechanisim was only one thing that was wrong with this bass. the preamp / pup system that was in it sounded like poo and the neck and overall playability of the thing was poo as well. worst washburn i ever played ever. i think i traded it for a tube amp. good deal!

anyhow ... where it doesnt make sense to me ... those screw in fine tuner thingeys on the Bach trem werent fine tuners. the base of the screw landed on the ball end of the string and from just touching to screwing down the beejesuses out of it made no difference in tuning. the only line of thinking of the engineering of it that i could figure is with a divebomb, so the ball end of the string stays put and has no chance of travel to the open end of the slot where you put the ball in and it popping out. weird ... since the divebomb on this trem didnt even come close to having that much travel. so those finger screw in thingeys basically did nothing ... but they did look cool. whatevs. perhaps in this redesign trem you got they have more of a necessity or hey, maybe are fine tuners ... especially if your gonna use something like a locking plate at the nut.

those roller saddles are a mystery to me. ive never seen rollers like that before. the Bach trem on the Washburn Bantams had saddles that were just a rounded over metal T. by the time i got mine, the saddles were a chewed and gouged up from stainless roundwound strings. youde think that would have led to string break issues over time but i didnt. go figure. maybe this was an upgrade Bach did on their trems after seeing kahler's roller saddles. they are cool.

well, good luck installing it and keep us up to date. i gotta find all the other threads i havent read in months.

and dvassafor6 ........ ironbirds.

been down this road. tried it, failed and should just let you know.

the ironbird came with the option for a few years with a kahler trem. other years and not any more, it didnt. as you know from having one (the hondo ... badass btw) that the kahler trem has a large footprint and most of that behind the intonation line. after research and trying to figure out how they got it to work, the bodies of the ironbirds from the years where they offered the option of a kahler trem have a different, longer body shape. i saw pictures of ironbirds with them and without them. mine did not have one and i wanted to put one on. every time i took measurements i came to the same conclusion ... "i dont know who they got it to work!!!!!!!!"

i called the b.c. rich factory in California USA (new shop btw) and went back and forth with 5 or 6 people who, after admitted they didnt know about the kahler, how to install one or that b.c. rich ever even offered that option, basically told me it would fit and to just slap it on there untill i got the one oldtimer who works in the shop. he told me he remembered that bass because he hated it and it was a nightmare ... that all the body templates changed for the model to make it work, they finally got it into production and then they stopped and switched back to the old templates. the years they made it with the option even the ones with the hardtail still had the same body shape. if you look at a buncha old pics of these basses, because more were made and sold without the option, that some ironbird's hardtail bridge comes right to the end of the body and others have some "extra wood" behind the hardtail bridge.

if you want to put a kahler on one, the best way to go is to find one of the ones with that "extra wood". i think that rectangle shape is actually wider too.

the only other options would be to .........

move the neck pocket forward by shimming the neck away from the body or plug it and route a new pocket, moving the scale towards the nut and giving extra room for the kahler on the back of the bass.

(no thanks!)

or .......

use an existing bird as a template taking the extra room needed to accommodate the kahler into consideration and cut a new body.

(whee!)

just read your dream bass intentions in your post and thought i should pass that info along. maybe help you avoid the frustration i went thru.

does that bridge look familiar to anyone?

It does to me!

dvassafor6 wrote:

I feel like I've seen one of these before, maybe on a washburn? It may have been custom

bootsox wrote:

I feel like I've seen one of these before, maybe on a washburn?  It may have been custom

Boots, you might be thinking of the Bach Musik bass trems that were on Washburn Bantam basses for a while.

Very interesting tremolo! Is it produced by a company on a large scale or is it the result of the handiwork of a talented craftsman? Could you give me some more details about it, please?

EricHaven wrote:

bootsox wrote:

I feel like I've seen one of these before, maybe on a washburn?  It may have been custom

Boots, you might be thinking of the Bach Musik bass trems that were on Washburn Bantam basses for a while.

 It wasn't a bantam, if it was in fact a washburn it was something like a stage bass, real funky looking thing.  This was probably around 10 years ago so my memory on it was fuzzy.  Plus, I wasn't really looking much at the rest of the bass, I had to soak in the trem before the sales guy saw me liking something.  Somehow whenever he sees me liking something I walk out of the store a bass richer and $1000 lighter.

And like I said, it may have been custom.