Floyd Rose releases Stone Tone granite block

Shawn Lutz":1rxs7wb4 said:
I think FU is running out of things to upgrade honestly. I get a lot of their upgrades do in fact work but they seem to be getting into snake oil territory to me.
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No doubt about that...although I love the tone of my brass spring claw :scared:
 
rupe":2z1t3lz3 said:
Without actually trying it, which apparently nobody here has, how the hell do you know that it doesn't bring something to the party? How is this inherently worse than an oversized brass block or a titanium/tungsten/copper/stainless steel block?

I'm not about to run out and buy one, but I'm not going to pan it based on ZERO experience either.
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Fair enough. The description and concept seem far fetched to me, but I'm not acoustic engineer. I've used large brass and tungsten blocks and like the results. Maybe I'd be willing to try this. I would be concerned with the springs chipping out of the stone, but maybe that's the real genius in this product: it's consumable so you have to keep buying them as they wear down.
 
Seems a bit out there but hey, everyone thought titanium was crazy when those came out.

I'm still a big fan of over sized brass blocks for Floyds and that's what I stick with.

I wonder how an ebony block would work if you put some brass threaded inserts in the top to screw to the base and some thin brass tubes in the trem springs holes so the spring hooks don't dig into the actual wood. I wonder if it would hold up to the tension abuse of the strings fighting the springs? On paper it would make more sense to try wood rather than rock, but who knows the rock could....rock. ha ha ha
 
The trem block has one primary job: to be heavy. It's there to ensure that NO string vibration is transferred from the strings to the bridge, because you want all the string vibration to stay IN THE STRINGS.

Ever played a pick-up basketball game where the backboard is loosely attached to some shitty old wobbly pole, and when you take a shot the ball hits the backboard and just stops dead and falls to the ground? Or, even worse, the pole actually wobbles at a specific frequency and thus sometimes if the ball hits the backboard at just the right moment the wobbling backboard whacks the ball back up court like a tennis racquet? Those problems are removed if you attach the backboard firmly to the pole(s) on which it is mounted, and fix the poles firmly to the wall or the ground. You want all the energy to stay in the elasticity of the ball.

Same problem with guitar. You don't want any part of a floating bridge either soaking up vibration or vibrating at a frequency you don't want. You want all the energy to stay in the elasticity of the strings. But you can't fix "the poles firmly to the wall or the ground" because there's no wall or ground to attach to - the bridge is floating in mid air. That's the whole point. The only thing you can do is make the bridge as physically massive as possible so that plain old inertia approximates having a connection to something solid. That's why trem blocks are often referred to as "inertia blocks".

Now there's limited space in the back of a guitar so the most efficient way of getting the most mass into the smallest space is to use material that is very dense. Size being equal, the heavier the trem block the better because that means less string vibration is getting lost to the bridge. It doesn't matter if the material is soft or hard, strong or brittle, it just has to be DENSE. Densities of some materials that are sold to GASsing guitarists - bigger numbers are better:

Brass: approx 8.6 grams of weight per cubic centimeter of the metal
Steel: approx 7.85 g/cm3
Zinc: approx 7.14 g/cm3
Titanium: approx 4.5 g/cm3
Granite: approx 2.6 g/cm3

Summary: snake oil.

(For the guitarist who has more money than sense - gold, approx 19.3 g/cm3)
 
shgshg":2v9ozlbn said:
Brass: approx 8.6 grams of weight per cubic centimeter of the metal
Steel: approx 7.85 g/cm3
Zinc: approx 7.14 g/cm3
Titanium: approx 4.5 g/cm3
Granite: approx 2.6 g/cm3

Summary: snake oil.

(For the guitarist who has more money than sense - gold, approx 19.3 g/cm3)
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You're far too logical.

:banhim:

I keeeeeed, I keeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed.
 
:)

Even when titanium blocks were the latest thing I thought to myself "lightweight titanium for an inertia block? that's the stupidest idea I ever heard", but like the man said there's a new sucker born every minute. And a product to match.
 
Once the ponytailed geniuses in the marketing department can come up with a way to pitch it that doesn't bring to mind images of "sinkers" and "poisoning", rest assured there will be a high-priced lead block available.
 
shgshg":2icin9af said:
The trem block has one primary job: to be heavy. It's there to ensure that NO string vibration is transferred from the strings to the bridge, because you want all the string vibration to stay IN THE STRINGS.

Ever played a pick-up basketball game where the backboard is loosely attached to some shitty old wobbly pole, and when you take a shot the ball hits the backboard and just stops dead and falls to the ground? Or, even worse, the pole actually wobbles at a specific frequency and thus sometimes if the ball hits the backboard at just the right moment the wobbling backboard whacks the ball back up court like a tennis racquet? Those problems are removed if you attach the backboard firmly to the pole(s) on which it is mounted, and fix the poles firmly to the wall or the ground. You want all the energy to stay in the elasticity of the ball.

Same problem with guitar. You don't want any part of a floating bridge either soaking up vibration or vibrating at a frequency you don't want. You want all the energy to stay in the elasticity of the strings. But you can't fix "the poles firmly to the wall or the ground" because there's no wall or ground to attach to - the bridge is floating in mid air. That's the whole point. The only thing you can do is make the bridge as physically massive as possible so that plain old inertia approximates having a connection to something solid. That's why trem blocks are often referred to as "inertia blocks".

Now there's limited space in the back of a guitar so the most efficient way of getting the most mass into the smallest space is to use material that is very dense. Size being equal, the heavier the trem block the better because that means less string vibration is getting lost to the bridge. It doesn't matter if the material is soft or hard, strong or brittle, it just has to be DENSE. Densities of some materials that are sold to GASsing guitarists - bigger numbers are better:

Brass: approx 8.6 grams of weight per cubic centimeter of the metal
Steel: approx 7.85 g/cm3
Zinc: approx 7.14 g/cm3
Titanium: approx 4.5 g/cm3
Granite: approx 2.6 g/cm3

Summary: snake oil.

(For the guitarist who has more money than sense - gold, approx 19.3 g/cm3)
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There's so much wrong with this dissertation that I'm not going to bother pointing it all out. Lots of opinion being presented as fact, and a lot of incorrect assumption...sprinkle some real data on top and voila, you've likely duped many of the lesser informed.
 
I would like to try one albeit not at that price. The only way to know is to try it, I thought a brass block would have marginal effect and they proved me wrong.

I'll be stopping by the local countertop places dumpster ASAP.

A buddy of mine has a machine shop is that presumably where this stone was cut and drilled? On metalworking machines?
 
The new Stonetone® Rock Blocks offer many attributes: Speaks faster, Clearer articulate tone and even volume on all strings, cleans up unwanted harmonics, insane sustain to name a few..


Press Release for December 2013 / 2014.

Floyd Rose Announces Stone Tone® Rock Blocks Distribution
WALL TOWNSHIP, NJ - Floyd Rose is proud to announce exclusive distribution of Stone
Tone® Rock Block sustain blocks. These patented blocks are made of granite, and are designed
to enhance and strengthen the sound of your tremolo-equipped instrument across the entire audio
spectrum. After installing a Stone Tone® block, the guitar’s clarity, sustain, and overall tone will
be improved equally in all ranges of the fret board… the extraordinary results of this upgrade are
indisputable.
Granite, when quarried in its natural state, is not only of an ideal density for the purpose of
sustain, but also has a crystalline atomic structure which is ideal for sonic transference— it
requires no factory processing or dilution, and the natural change in sound, upon installation, is
so drastic that signal loss from the guitar to the amplifier will be decreased by at least 30%. The
Stone Tone® Rock Block is compatible with the Floyd Rose Original Tremolo System and its
derivatives, as well as many licensed models. Comes with stainless steel sustain block mounting
screws… check it out at the new floydrose.com.


Floyd Rose has a plenty of marketing coordinated for December in Several promotions for several products and giveaways. You will get your fill with a ton of reviews, video, testamonies etc. when FR is ready to release it. We @ Stonetone® have been cranking the Blocks out "All handmade"here in SWFL to have plenty available as many have ordered already. There hasn't been 1 negative comment of any kind about the product, performance.... other than folks who rely on untruths that haven't been proven to this concept. So if it drives those folks to open there mouths before realizing actually what there commenting about or understands the granites performance they should think deep and really think about what there saying because remember, Floyd Rose didn't just say hey cool idea some one will buy it yea, well distribute it for you... This has been an ongoing event for a long time until now that it is ABSOLUTE fact of everything FR has posted in our press release. If you are curious then buy one and hear it for yourself you won't regret it.
 
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