You know the story – you’re mid solo and about to move the audience to tears of awe and emotion with some poignant vibrato action.  You reach for your trem and… nothing.  It’s not where you left it.  The damn thing’s flapped all over the place during your last number and is now pointing backwards.  Your fumbling about for it ruins the moment.  The audience is lost.  They start to throw pint-pots and Pringles tubes – eeeeuuuuww, original flavour.

There is a solution to loose and flappy whammy bars.  Meet the Staytrem and say goodbye to loose vibrato/trem arms.

It comes in a snazzy, guitar-shaped plastic case and includes a snazzy, guitar-shaped spanner.  Rather than just a bar with a right angle and a few screw threads, the Staytrem works like this:

What gets screwed into the vibrato bridge is a threaded post – this is screwed in until tight.  Attached to this post is the actual vibrato arm.  The arm rotates around the post. The tension of the arm on the post is adjusted by the little plastic dome on the end of the post.  You simply tighten it to your preference and, voila, the arm stays where you put it.

The Staytrem comes with different threaded posts to fit different types of Strats and other vibrato systems.  You can even send your existing whammy bar to the company and they’ll make sure they send the correct size back to you.

Cost is UK£40 (plus £2.50 postage) and the Staytrem is currently sold through eBay.  More information, and buying link, at Staytrem.