Hi all! Wanting to get a Kahler, new to trems.

Hi I'm Tommy, a friend of Darkstrike's, and I have a project pbass I want to put a Kahler trem on. It is a 98 squier pbass, I intend on putting a trem on it but my mother says she wants to see that lots of people have em and are happy. So show your's off and tell why you love it. Also I don't want to spend over $150 on one, I'm having trouble finding em used... any suggestions?


Thx

-Tommy

Ah, glad to see you here buddy,

Well, I've had two trems, with two years, as you know, and couldn't be happier, they're perfect.

I love em not only because you can drop notes into oblivion, but because they're so flexible (6-way saddle adjustability). And once you have it dialed in perfectly, it's about as high-mass as a bridge can get with sustain and tone up the Wazoo. A Kahler will offer you superior sustain, setup, and tremolo function. If you set up your bass right--and a P bass is a great bass to put one on--it'll provide you with smooth, flawless action from screaming highs to bowel-shaking lows.

That good enough for ya?

What else are you gonna do to this P?

I have had mine since the 80's and would not have a bass without one.

I got one of mine used for $40 from Spadetoyou from Talkbass.


Typically, used they go for around $150 - $200 on Ebay

If you have a shop install it, your looking at anywhere from $150 - $200 additional.


The good thing about a Kahler is it also functions a regular bridge.


I would not hesitate to put one on

hesitation because of money nothin.

wait till you go to buy one and you realize the specs that are involved.

you cant just go buy one and slap it on your bass. some basses, some models dont fit.

i know ... the p bass setup needs a 7410 hybrid (or similar XX10 rear facing saddle model).

i have drawings with the specs from this model if you want them. its more information with intonation +- spacing and depth +-'s than you get from kahler or anywhere else i've found. something you'll definately need if your going to install yourself.

lemme know and i'll get it to you.

my p bass .............



my ibanez ... currently undergoing serious rehab ............



welcome to BTF!

Well I was going to make it a P/J but me and a friend (TB'r) have long been wondering about doing a J/P so I thing I'm going to do that, it will also be refinished in hot pink, sonic blue or lime green, I will be adding a black star logo to the arm contour (like my mike dirnt bass), black hardwear, and I'm painting the neck/headstock black (like the 1980's jazz bass special, or duff bass), and the trem.

It is a maga combo of all my favorite basses pretty much, IMO it should be beast! The pbass pup is a QP and in bridge pos it should be as high output as a cheap jazz pup (I think)


Edit: I'm buying tools and my uncle is teaching my some carpentry (cause he does it for a living) so I will be able to do the routes myself

Thx for the help and stuff!

Yes I'll take the drawings and such please!

T. Gunn wrote:

Well I was going to make it a P/J but me and a friend (TB'r) have long been wondering about doing a J/P so I thing I'm going to do that, it will also be refinished in hot pink, sonic blue or lime green, I will be adding a black star logo to the arm contour (like my mike dirnt bass), black hardwear, and I'm painting the neck/headstock black (like the 1980's jazz bass special, or duff bass), and the trem.

It is a maga combo of all my favorite basses pretty much, IMO it should be beast! The pbass pup is a QP and in bridge pos it should be as high output as a cheap jazz pup (I think)


Edit: I'm buying tools and my uncle is teaching my some carpentry (cause he does it for a living) so I will be able to do the routes myself

Thx for the help and stuff!

You mean putting the P pickup at the bridge and the J at the neck? I dig it! I've been wondering why people don't do that more often. It sounds like it'd be a really tasty setup.

That's good to hear! Making the rout for a Kahler trem is well within the beginner woodworking skill range. Madmike's diagrams will be of great help. When you install/set it up yourself, you get a whole new feel,l connection, and respect for the device.

Chowderboots wrote:

T. Gunn wrote:

Well I was going to make it a P/J but me and a friend (TB'r) have long been wondering about doing a J/P so I thing I'm going to do that, it will also be refinished in hot pink, sonic blue or lime green, I will be adding a black star logo to the arm contour (like my mike dirnt bass), black hardwear, and I'm painting the neck/headstock black (like the 1980's jazz bass special, or duff bass), and the trem.

It is a maga combo of all my favorite basses pretty much, IMO it should be beast! The pbass pup is a QP and in bridge pos it should be as high output as a cheap jazz pup (I think)


Edit: I'm buying tools and my uncle is teaching my some carpentry (cause he does it for a living) so I will be able to do the routes myself

Thx for the help and stuff!

You mean putting the P pickup at the bridge and the J at the neck? I dig it! I've been wondering why people don't do that more often. It sounds like it'd be a really tasty setup.

That's good to hear! Making the rout for a Kahler trem is well within the beginner woodworking skill range. Madmike's diagrams will be of great help. When you install/set it up yourself, you get a whole new feel,l connection, and respect for the device.

Yes, very tasty setup IMO


Thx for the info... more trem porn pof favor LOL

T. Gunn wrote:

Yes, very tasty setup IMO


Thx for the info... more trem porn pof favor LOL

I like the idea of having a slanted or staggered pickup at the bridge and a straight pickup at the neck. I wish more basses had that option.

I have one bass with a Kahler trem right now--my Jackson Kelly. My Hamer Blitz is missing its bridge (I need to get the route modified to recess the trem's base) and I have a 2400 sitting around that I don't know what I'm going to put it on. I might sell it. I don't know.

Here's my Hamer right after I had the Kahler installed. All black! Yuck. The action was a little high for my taste, but the trem worked great! Loved how well it stayed in tune and how long those Dunlop strings lasted and worked with the trem.



Here's the trem on my Jackson:



That's about the angle that you want the saddles to be at. As you can see, the base plate is recessed to achieve proper action and saddle height. This bass is a little finicky by nature in tuning its stability. Even though it has a graphite nut, there is still a lot of clicking and binding of the strings in the nut. The neck also shifts very noticeably between winter and summer. It might be because its neck through? I don't know. But the Kahler makes for a great bridge for such an odd bass (neck like a baseball bat--just how I like it) since I can tailor the string height and spacing to the neck shape

There are some possible hangups that you should be aware of with Kahlers. Since there isn't a locking system for basses, you have to make sure that the strings slide smoothly through the nut and string trees (roller string trees and a graphite nut will help a lot!), that the saddles are at the right angle (the strings don't bottom out on the saddles like they did on my Hamer), and that the base plate will fit between the bridge pickup and the bottom of the bass.

Man, where the heck was I for this post???

Welcome to BTF, T Gunn! Great to have you aboard!

I don't have anything to add to what the Guys have said already, as all of it is the right stuff. The only other thing I can suggest is giving our thread Keeping It In Tune a read-over to have a more thorough picture of proper set-up and tuning stability.

As far as convincing your mom, I'll throw in my two-cents of praise. I got my first Kahler in June of 1984, and ever since that day, it has become the single most important piece of gear that I have never, and will never, be caught without, period. I have owned close to a dozen of these things over the years, and I will literally go to my grave with one in my hand.

Tommy? Can you hear me?

Sweet! Why the thing around the bridge pup? And how often do strings break? I plan to be pulling up a lot more than pushing down, so will I be breaking strings more often? I will be getting a rolling string tree will be gotten but IDK about a graphite nut, tI'm trying not to go over $200 in mods. I'm hoping $150 for the trem, and $50 for new cloth wrapped wires, black tuners, black knobs, the j pup, and reranch paint.

T. Gunn wrote:

Sweet! Why the thing around the bridge pup? And how often do strings break? I plan to be pulling up a lot more than pushing down, so will I be breaking strings more often? I will be getting a rolling string tree will be gotten but IDK about a graphite nut, tI'm trying not to go over $200 in mods. I'm hoping $150 for the trem, and $50 for new cloth wrapped wires, black tuners, black knobs, the j pup, and reranch paint.

I've never broken a string using one of these trems. I've only broken one or two strings anyway on my basses. If you do pull ups, you're going to wear out your strings A LOT and you will vastly increase your chances of breaking strings, especially with tremolo-friendly gauges. Be careful--strings aren't rubber bands. These trems have the range to snap strings and put a lot of strain on your bass. At most, I've only been able to get a step or so of rise, but I've been able to drop the strings until they don't even produce a discernible note.

The graphite nut is optional. You can rub pencil in the nut slots to help lubricate the strings (some people use Vaseline. There are even graphite formulas similar to the stuff you can spray in stiff locks that you can use to keep the strings from binding in the slots) and make sure that the nut slots are allowing the strings to slide through them. If the slots are making the strings catch at the nut, your tuning stability will suffer. After you have used the trem, the strings will often be sharp and will "ping" back into place maybe after a little wiggling. Or they won't at all. It's best to keep any obstructions (most of which are found at the headstock) from harming your tuning stability to get the most out of your trem.

Ok, I do have some graphite powder which I think would work. What is trem friendly gauges? I know of really cheap strings (like $0.89 a string) should those? I was thinking that would be good cause I might be breaking strings so often.


So what about the thing on the bridge pu?

T. Gunn wrote:

Ok, I do have some graphite powder which I think would work. What is trem friendly gauges? I know of really cheap strings (like $0.89 a string) should those? I was thinking that would be good cause I might be breaking strings so often.


So what about the thing on the bridge pu?

That'd probably work great! Save you money/time on a new nut. If that fails, give pencil or Vaseline a try. Whatever works works, you know? Pencil has worked alright for me (until I ground down the nut slots from using the trem so much!) and I have yet to give the Graphtech nut I carved and installed a test. On my Hamer, that is.

There aren't any specific gauges that you should or shouldn't use with a Kahler bass trem, so pardon that expression, but heavier strings will make it harder to use the trem (it'll feel very stiff) and lighter gauges will tend to give you more range (probably better for pull ups) and better action (not as hard to push the arm up or down). You might also want to experiment with taking the center spring off and seeing how having two (instead of the standard three) springs works with the string gauges in giving you better tension.

You mean the pickup ring on my Jackson Kelly? It's just a plastic pickup surround or bezel, which is how many guitar-sized humbuckers are mounted on guitars without a pickguard.

Oh when you said this "and that the base plate will fit between the bridge pickup and the bottom of the bass." I thought you were talking bout the thing round the pup. I'll try it with 3 springs and I'll later try 2 springs, see what I'll think.


Your 17, how'd you get your mom to let you to get one? I'm 14 so I'm in the same place, I think.

T. Gunn wrote:

Oh when you said this "and that the base plate will fit between the bridge pickup and the bottom of the bass." I thought you were talking bout the thing round the pup. I'll try it with 3 springs and I'll later try 2 springs, see what I'll think.


Your 17, how'd you get your mom to let you to get one? I'm 14 so I'm in the same place, I think.

Oh, no. I didn't install the trem on that bass. It's been that way since 1985. But look at that photo of my Blitz--you see that the tremolo is right up against the bridge pickup? Almost didn't have enough room on that one, but it can still be intonated properly. Some basses don't have enough room at all between the bridge pickup and the end of the body for the tremolo to fit, just because it's such a large bridge. There is also a problem on that Blitz in that the control cavity is really large and close to the side of the Kahler. The whole trem had to be mounted slightly off center so that the screws had enough wood to dig into.

My mom didn't buy it for me, I did. I don't think she knew about it until the package showed up at the door.

Ah ok!


My mom isn't buying it but says "Just buy a bass with a wammy already on it", when I tell her that's only guitars that have em she responds "Well they must not be very good if they're not stock"


Good lord! SO I have to now show her it's good before I get one

T. Gunn wrote:

Ah ok!


My mom isn't buying it but says "Just buy a bass with a wammy already on it", when I tell her that's only guitars that have em she responds "Well they must not be very good if they're not stock"


Good lord! SO I have to now show her it's good before I get one

Mhmm, I could understand that reasoning because having a trem on a bass is far from normal. Kahler are EXTREMELY high quality. I'd be more worried about tuning stability than quality, but with proper modification and maintenance, that shouldn't be a problem, either.

So, should we pen a nice letter of approval for your mom?

Seriously, is her concern that you will be investing in a bad idea? One thing you can tell her is that to buy a bass that already comes with a trem will be much more expensive then installing one, assuming you can even locate one. Back in the day, there were a handful of companies that did offer the option, but not so much anymore. Most basses nowadays do not offer trems as an option, and those that do are usually high-end boutique brands.

You can also let her know that having a trem on your bass is not only an additional tool of un-equaled abilities, but it will also make you stand out as a player. They do get one noticed a lot more often!

As far as the string breakage issue, personally I'm not a big fan of pulling up too much since this will, as Martin pointed out, cause your strings to break a lot more often. Now, the Kahler can and does work for pulling notes upward, but if you go too far, you will pull your bass severely out of tune at the very least. I have mine set to pull upwards only about a half-step at the most, but I can drop my E string over an octave, as I definitely favor dive-bombing. And given the amount of abuse I put on my trem, I usually break a string once every two weeks. This is not to say that you will have the same results, of course, but it is something to consider.

Cheap strings are probably a good way to go. If you find that don't like them, at least you didn't spend much money on them. In that respect, strings are kinda like women.

Sorry... That was crude.

T. Gunn wrote:

I intend on putting a trem on it but my mother says she wants to see that lots of people have em and are happy. So show your's off and tell why you love it.

Well, you're not going to find too many people with them. The uniqueness was partly why I got one. You will find plenty of people who are VERY happy with them though.

Anyway, its already been posted elsewhere, but here's my trem bass, a 2007 Spector NS-2J-EX with a maple burl top. I call her Woodstock

T. Gunn wrote:

Also I don't want to spend over $150 on one, I'm having trouble finding em used... any suggestions?

Man KS, that truly is one gorgeous bass you have there!

i like handing this out to new members like it was candy ............





my experience has been with doing a fender p bass, to get the action low enuff it was necessary for me to recess the entire bridge about 1/8" into the surface of the bass. if the saddles are all the way down, the strings will buzz on the saddle housings and still be pretty high off the frets.

just letting you know ... you may want to router more than just the pocket for the springs and mechanical motion of the thing.

good routering to you sir!

sawdust city!

Thx much dude. I'm guessing this will help a lot when I get to routing

So color options are... (these all have black hardwear, black neck/headstock, and black star)


My narrowed down list:

Sea Foam Green
Sonic Blue
Hot pink
Lime Green (<I was thinking this would look more glossy than SFG)


Thx guys!

With the black neck, lime.....

I would go lime green as well.

Another vote for lime green.

Lime green would be SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET!

Unanimous...the masses want a green machine!

Chowderboots wrote:

Unanimous...the masses want a green machine!

You mean like this one?

i'm gonna tell you lime green ... because .......

1) it would look cool with the black.

2) its not my bass ... i cant refinish anything of mine not blue.

3) it will be 'in your face' with the kahler and lime.

4) who out there (professionally) plays a lime green and black bass? i cant think of anyone. (this is where you all post pics)

5) demand is the only thing thats gonna make fender / squire stop offering so many boreing instruments. i sent them a picture of what i did to their pos p bass ... they havent gotten back to me about wether they liked it or not.

Kugelspot wrote:

You mean like this one?

Something like that.

thanks kugel ... posted right as i hit send ... like i wasnt paying attention.

keep posting pics .

i love that song.

madmike wrote:

demand is the only thing thats gonna make fender / squire stop offering so many boreing instruments. i sent them a picture of what i did to their pos p bass ... they havent gotten back to me about wether they liked it or not.

I feel like things will get better in the next few years. Apparently Fender got a new head of the bass department a few years ago who is (*gasp!*) actually a bass player. Hence, the Squier Vintage Modifieds, MIM Js with maple fretboards, and the Sub-Lime Bass Fuzz (which is surprisingly awesome)

2 years ago that squre geddy lee jazz model got some award for bass of the year. i played one. it was nice.

but plain.

Actually I have a TB thread (funny you guys talk about this) where I took requests and I am mailing squier a petition. I told squier about it on their facebook and they showed intreast and told me that they have stuff coming out soon... good stuff!


Imma also gettin mockups done of the bass in all the colors from the same guy who did my avatar, he is the best!

Kugelspot wrote:

madmike wrote:

demand is the only thing thats gonna make fender / squire stop offering so many boreing instruments. i sent them a picture of what i did to their pos p bass ... they havent gotten back to me about wether they liked it or not.

I feel like things will get better in the next few years. Apparently Fender got a new head of the bass department a few years ago who is (*gasp!*) actually a bass player. Hence, the Squier Vintage Modifieds, MIM Js with maple fretboards, and the Sub-Lime Bass Fuzz (which is surprisingly awesome)

Yeah I read about that. I'm curious to see what they come out with. As long as they keep making those '57 RI Ps with the one piece maple necks until I can buy one, I'm happy!

T.Gunn wrote:

Actually I have a TB thread (funny you guys talk about this) where I took requests and I am mailing squier a petition. I told squier about it on their facebook and they showed intreast and told me that they have stuff coming out soon... good stuff!


Imma also gettin mockups done of the bass in all the colors from the same guy who did my avatar, he is the best!

Wow neat! Exciting stuff in the Fender camp.

yeah well ... fender needs to do something super rediculous to get my interest going that would make me want one of their products. i havent really seen anything interesting since their ergodyne models and haddent wanted anything of theirs since the stu ham model.

perhaps a new radical body style? p this, jazz that ... blah, blah, blah. put out something boutique ... or even pointey! be careful ... dont make it ugly!

fender do a pointy? ( perk ).... not a chance....hahahaha

too many people are stuck with their precious p/jazz body, and if you ask any of those narrow minded people they will say "why change perfection"...oh BROTHER!!!

but those same people will drop 600 into a new bridge,pickups,tuners,AND NATURALLY a new pickguard color, so they can play the stupid things.
and if you tell them to add a kahler, they will also say "those should only be on guitars"


Tommy, are you tommygun from TB?

amimbari wrote:

fender do a pointy? ( perk ).... not a chance....

Except they already did, more than once, not to mention that they own Jackson.....

who said anything about Jackson? I meant Kramer, cause they never had a FULL pointy


I know they made a couple years worth of banannaheadstocked units that looked like a Kramer, thanks to the TB members putting pics on the board but the die-hard FenderFans said UGLY/NON-TRADITIONAL, and they stopped because they didn't have a market for them, and they went back to what sells.

wasn't that another 80's thing to get people interested in a Fender rather than a Epiphone/Jackson/Kramer ( forget about all the clone companies )

They did a jaggedy flying V bass, too, and some other ones.

amimbari wrote:

and they stopped because they didn't have a market for them, and they went back to what sells.

Bingo, why the hell should they make pointy stuff, when people actually buy their normal stuff, they ain't in business to suit you, they're out for cash, like most any business.

no argument on my end DS....if I bought 250,000 units annually under contract and TOLD them either make a pointy body/head or I would not renew my contract and they would lose my business....well NO COMPANY would say no to that, but yes you are 100%..... for a few sold here and there they would NEVER do it even if it was a 1 time run, and failed sales would say "we tried but nothing came from it".....

as everyone knows, it costs a LOT of money long before the first guitar even hits the assemblyline

Exactly, just like Fodera make instruments I do not like, in any way, but heck, I ain't gonna be buying a rack of them, even if I did like 'em.


Honestly, I would have killed for their old flying V, was swanky, a little like the Randy Rhodes, with a P pickup, or the Katana, that was sweet too, eh, its easy to find pointy schizz elsewhere...

Darkstrike wrote:

Exactly.


Honestly, I would have killed for their old flying V, was swanky, a little like the Randy Rhodes, with a P pickup, or the Katana, that was sweet too.

Oh the Katana...I've seen a couple of those...

Chowderboots wrote:

Darkstrike wrote:

Exactly.


Honestly, I would have killed for their old flying V, was swanky, a little like the Randy Rhodes, with a P pickup, or the Katana, that was sweet too.

Oh the Katana...I've seen a couple of those...

Yeah, the Katana, it was the one with the weird shaped pickups, and a super skinny 24 fret neck, and pointy headstock, sounded utterly awesome.

I remember it looking not quite as graceful as the name suggests.