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Converting and Edge/Edge variant to an Schaller/OFR arm

15K views 27 replies 14 participants last post by  James 
#1 · (Edited)
I dont have an issue with the Edge bars like alot of people have, but i live in a desert, and they dont move around on me much. But the one on the lo pro i installed in my RG350 busted, and i practically had to hammer the bar in, and rip it out. I tried reassembling the barlock part of the assembly, but no good, so its time for a swap.

This is around on the web, but the pictures are missing, and i didnt feel the description was very clear. I have pictures, which are cellphone and a bit blurry, but ill give illustrations as well

This works on all the high end edge and variant models, so the Edge, The Lo Pro Edge, and the Edge Pro, both 6 and 7 string models.

This consists of 2 parts. First, Removing the old collar unit, and Second, adding the new collar unit.

What you need
  • A Schaller/OFR arm assembly
  • A crescent wrench (Pliers work, but a crescent wrench is preferable)
  • A very wide bladed flathead screwdriver
  • A fine head phillips screwdriver
  • A hammer
  • LocTite (Optional but recommended)

Procedure
Part One: Removing the old ibanez assembly.

  1. Remove Locking Spring
    if you look at the bottom of the assembly, there is a black screw directly in the bottom, which is holding a small black spring that goes into a hole in the side of the assembly. Remove this screw, and the spring. The spring usually will just fall out once the screw is removed. This small nub end of this spring that sits in the side of the assembly is what clicks into the groove on the tip of the edge bar, and holds the bar in the trem.
  2. Remove Assembly Locking Bolt
    Here starts the tricky part. if you look where you insert the bar on the top of the trem, you can see the assembly screwed into the baseplate. this assembly has a notch on either side of the circle. Looking at the bottom of the plate, right where the assembly and plate meet, you see a hex nut. This nut is what keeps the assembly from being unscrewed from the baseplate (so naturally, well remove this nut, since its at a direct moral and functional opposite to us). To remove the nut, use your flathead screwdriver on top of the plate, putting it across the hole where the bar goes, and into the 2 notches. The bitch part is finding a wide enough screw driver. I didnt have one, but i managed to use the flathead part of my Leatherman Supertool to dig into the inside of the assembly, and lock it. the metal did strip away inside a bit, and looks kinda like brass, but malformed like shitty pot metal.
    Use the screwdriver to hold the assembly in place, and then use your crescent wrench or pliers to break the nut loose (it can be tricky, locktite from the assembly sometimes leaks into this nut) and remove it.
  3. Remove Assembly Housing
    The last of the tricky bits. Use your screwdriver like you did before, across the 2 notches on top of the assembly (or simply dug inside lol) but this time, turn it counter clockwise. this part is DEFINITELY a bitch. ibanez likes to loktite the fuck out of these (which to be fair, is a good thing from a production standpoint), and ive heard of people having to have these drilled out cause they couldnt break them loose. Ive never had that issue, but it can take alot of force (heres where i tend to scrape metal shavings loose on the inside using the screwdriver). Once it breaks loose though it usually comes out without a lot of fuss

Part 2: Inserting the new assembly
  1. Disassemble New Assembly

    youll get a few bits with the new assembly. The arm, the assembly casing, an expansion casing, a washer and a screw.
    Take out the screw and washer, and the larger expansion casing should slide off. get rid of all this, we only need the bar and the assembly casing, the piece the bar screws into.
  2. Insert New Assembly Casing
    place the new assembly casing so the part where the bar screws onto is on top (unless you wanna grab your bar from inside the trem cavity :nuts:) and place it in the hole where the old assembly was. it will barely sit in place, only the beveled bottom edge fitting in. hit it with a dab of loctite around the edges, and hammer it in. I like to put something solid flat on top of it, like my closed up leatherman, so i dont ding up the threading with the hammer. Note: you will knock metal shavings (the thread where the old assembly screwed in) out the bottom, dont freak when you see this

Part 3: Screwing in the bar
  1. Screw the bar on
    _Yeah_

And there you have it!

Ill get pictures up ASAP but im having a hard time getting em off my phone
 
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#2 · (Edited)
Great Article :yesway: but there is one thing that needs to be added.

If you do this and the casing does not sit in there tightly then you will need to replace the screw that came with your bar with a 12mm long one of the same thread. (this can be found at your local Ace Harware or similar).

FWIW I had to do this to mine.
 
#14 ·
This. The Gotoh mount is the best available IMHO.
 
#10 ·
When I've done this I used a nylon washer on the top, since the Schaller arm holder has a flat bottom but the Edge has a slanted top. So the nylon washer gives a little and spreads the contact out over more surface. Ideally you'd have a mill handy and you'd counterbore a flat segment for the arm holder. But ideally I would be a billionaire and world hunger would be eradicated.
 
#11 ·
You don't need to use the 12mm screw, if you dispense with the washer that comes with the assembly it works just fine. Of course, that's on an Edge Lo-Pro, not an original edge, so I'm not sure if you explicitly need the longer screw for the originals.
 
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#12 ·
Good thinking frank!

The counterbore idea could be a total pain in the ass (may be worth doing to all of mine at once, but not anything id want to do on multiple occasions), but the nylon washer idea is great.
 
#24 ·
Done this replacement on a fair few guitars with edge bridges so far, really like the improvement as the bars on the edge trems are just too loose as they're really worn out.

Kind of slowly retrofitting them to all guitars as prefer the feel of them now, and they are more solid. Very worthwhile upgrade!

Only thing is putting the schaller one on can be fiddly as the base plate is thick enough to only allow for a little bit of contact when screwing it on, but once done it's fine :)
 
#25 ·
The CEO of Schaller responded to my e-mail about the housing and the bar I bought not being a good fit. He said he'd send me another, but that was at the start of the year.

Who'da thought Germans had such a prank-based sense of humour?
 
#26 ·
The CEO of Schaller responded to my e-mail about the housing and the bar I bought not being a good fit. He said he'd send me another, but that was at the start of the year.

Who'da thought Germans had such a prank-based sense of humour?
That strikes me as a little odd. I spoke to the same guy (Lars?), and he was nothing short of helpful. I had a 7 set of tuners at my door cheaper than if I was to purchase a 6 set from within the UK.
 
#28 ·
I did this mod to my silver dot's trem on Friday night, as the trem bar was missing and the arm holder was totally worn. Putting the bar from my green dot (which fits tightly in that) into the silver dot was like throwing a sausage into a train tunnel.

So, this was purchased from Amazon. A genuine Schaller OFR arm assembly, £13 delivered next day :yesway: Note the longer screw that comes with the set, that's what I ended up using.


The underside of the old trem. That crosshead screw needs undoing to remove the spring that holds the arm into the holder, as you can't get the holder out of the trem with it in place.


Jam a big screwdriver across the two slots in the top of the arm holder, grab the retaining nut with pliers and then unscrew the nut and removed the arm holder from the trem.


The Schaller arm holder slipped straight into the hole in my trem, so I installed the sleeve and screw from the Schaller kit to hold it in place. I needed to use the longer screw and leave off the silver washer to get it to *just* grip enough to stay tight. I'll either be looking for a slightly longer screw or filing a mm or so off the sleeve down the line, but it does for now.


All reassembled, arm on and ready to rock. The arm stays exactly where I leave it, and feel is excellent.


As you can probably tell from the pictures, I left the strings on and just popped the trem out for this, total time was probably between 5 and 10 minutes.
 
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