Tremolo Arm | Whammy Bar – Vibrato Unit
August 1st, 2010 | Author: guitarman
A tremolo arm also known as tremolo bar, whammy bar, or, more pedantically, a vibrato unit, is a lever attached to the bridge and/or the tailpiece of an electric guitar or archtop guitar; a steel-stringed acoustic or semi-acoustic guitar with a full body and a distinctive arched top. This is a common enough attachment that there is a specialized term, hard tail, for a guitar without one.
This attachment enables the player to rapidly alter the tension and occasionally the length of the strings temporarily, changing the pitch to produce a vibrato, portamento or pitch bend outcome. The term Vibrola is also applied by some guitar makers to describe their specific tremolo arm designs.
Since the regular appearance of mechanical tremolo arms in the 1950s, they have been utilized by many guitarists. However, much mix-up has been produced over the meaning of the terms “tremolo” and “vibrato” by naming one for the other. In general, vibrato is a variance in pitch, whereas tremolo is a variance in volume,
Most tremolo arms are founded on one of four basic designs:
• The Bigsby Vibrato Tailpiece
• The Floyd Rose locking tremolo
• The Stetsbar tremolo
• The Kahler Tremolo System
The last two tremolo arms are cam-driven designs based on pedal steel guitar conceptions. Many other designs also subsist in smaller numbers, notably numerous original designs commercialized by Gibson under the Vibrola name.
tremolo arm, tremolo bar
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