What is that little shiny metal thingy on the headstock of a Strat between the nut and the tuners and goes around the E string and the B string? What’s it do?
Peace,
mangeorge
It’s called a string tree. It helps to hold the strings more firmly against the nut.
I think it’s a guide to ensure that those strings stay put in the nut.
I’ve heard it called a string guide or butterfly string guide. It just keeps the high strings from sliding off the nut.
Yes, it is a string tree. It is less about holding the strings more firmly to the nut; it is more about keeping the strings above the nut from sympathetically vibrating. If you play with force, you can get them vibrating; that can get picked up by pickups and affect your sound.
I just went through this with my first project build - I started playing a new riff that really hits my high E string hard - I didn’t have a string tree in place and got an obnoxious “ping” whenever I hit the string. I installed a string tree and eliminated it…
I guess I’m misinformed then.
Nah - there is a guide aspect to it - especially when EVH innovated with much more aggressive whammy use before locking nuts got used, but I believe it was originally more about dampening vibrations…
http://www.guitarstringguide.com/drupal/content/should-i-remove-my-guitars-string-trees
Okay - so they are going for the guide purpose…
Fender’s headstocks are flat relative to the neck, not angled* so without the tree the strings don’t make much of an angle at the nut. Like everyone has already said.
- So there are fewer bits of wood used and there’s no need for a join, rather clever. It’s probably just about impossible to break the headstock off a Fender.
You’ll notice that the string tree is only used on the strings whose tuning pegs are furthest from the nut. That’s because the closer tuning pegs are, well, close enough to pull the strings down at an angle behind the nut. But the high E and B strings (or the D and G strings on a Fender bass) have their tuning pegs far enough from the nut that without the string tree, they would make an almost perfectly straight line from the bridge to the tuning peg. Thus, you’d get unwanted vibrations because string isn’t held tightly against the nut.
Actually, the A string on a Fender bass could really use a string tree as well, because its downward angle behind the nut is very slight — actually less than the strings to either side of it. I’ve heard many Fender bass players complain about the way the A string sounds different from the other strings.
It’s worth noting that the angled headstock was a standard design that had been in use on stringed instruments for hundreds of years before Leo Fender started building guitars, because it worked. Fender’s string tree method was less “clever design” and more “compensating for a flaw inherent in the cost-cutting straight-headstock”. Remember, before Fender came along most guitars and other stringed instruments were built largely by hand. Leo Fender developed assembly-line guitar construction to create a less expensive instrument, and the one-piece neck with a straight headstock was one way to both reduce the cost and to speed construction by removing several steps from the process.
(Note: I’m not slamming Fenders here — my primary instrument is a Fender Jazz Bass. It’s just worth noting that my $250 Rogue [Musician’s Friend house brand] 6-string bass with an angled headstock has a more consistent tone across all the strings than my $799 Fender.)
I remember, back in the day, seeing a player put a capo above the nut (toward the tuners). I assumed it was just a place to put it, but now I wonder if it was for this? It doesn’t seem like you’d want the strings clamped to the headstock, but who knows.
I am on break from a big meeting so can’t post long - but a quick check back into my geek memory bank -
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Straight pull peghead designs have been done before - most signficantly for this thread by Paul Bigsby, Leo’s friend and the guy who build Merle Travis’ solidbody guitar - the one with the Strat-type headstock design that Leo used when the Strat was designed.
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Leo wanted to do the straight-pull headstock because yes, as Mister Rik, said, it was a way to make the neck easier to manufacture, but also for at least a couple of other reasons:
> He wanted to make the design more rugged - he was building the guitar for honky-tonkers who complained of their angled headstock guitars snapping if they fell over the wrong way - a straight-pull headstock combats this super-effectively.> He always intended to have innovative whammy bars on his guitars and a straight-pull design is a lot less likely to get the strings to bind in the nut when you are using the whammy.
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The original Esquire prototypes were a Tele design with a 3-and-3 headstock. The headstock was still done with little/no angle, so he was trying to combat headstock-joint weakness, but still 3-and-3 (there’s one at the NY RRHall of Fame Annex that I just saw). While Leo didn’t include a whammy on the in-production Broadcaster design (Tele’s were originally called Broadcasters), I suspect he changed to 6 in line as part of seeing Bigsby’s design, wanting to cut down on production costs, supporting better vibrato/whammy functionality, etc…
A couple of other random points:
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When EVH starts the song Runnin’ with Devil - right after the horns go by and before the opening riff, there is a high-pitched set of tones. That’s Eddie strumming his strings above the peghead - he didn’t put string trees on his Frankenstein guitar - I think to keep them from binding up when he whammy’d…
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The new Eric Johnson Strats don’t have string trees (I think) because he prefers not having them so they don’t bind up…
All I have for now - gotta get back to my meeting…
…so my argument that he added string trees to the straight-pull design was a way to have his cake - get all the benefits he wanted above - and eat it, too - i.e., keep sympathetic vibrations to a minimum and keep the strings seated in the nut…so ultimately my statement “it was to dampen string vibrations” was a gross overstatement - sorry 'bout that…
Gotta run…