Another real problem was most of my floyd issues happened during the 1990's, when Jazzmasters, Jaguars, Mustangs, Les Pauls, Telecasters, and other vintage-style guitars were the rock n' roll princesses of the guitar rack. Most stores did not carry Floyd Parts because they did not sell, everyone wanted Jag/Jazz/Stang parts instead, and for many years, those were just as much a pain to get as the Floyd Rose parts. These are great days for guitar parts.
I remember those days vividly. The only guitar parts makers everyone knew were Warmoth, DiMarzio, Seymour Duncan, EMG, Schaller, Kluson, and the usual huge names. Most guitar parts companies, if not all, only catered to the (non-super metal) Strat, Tele, Jazz Bass, P-Bass, and Gibson guitars. If you wanted anything else it was considered weird and unusual, and you probably got laughed at by the bitter 70's guitar hero worshipper behind the counter. Kahler was dead, Floyd Rose was trying to move into the vintage-strat trem market...
Oddly, another funny thing I remember was back then there were NO parts for offsets. No bodies for Jaguar, Jazzmaster, Jag-Stang, Mustang or anything. 24" scale necks were non-existant aside from butchering an existing Jag or Stang. Nobody made the pickups either, one reason so many Jags and Jazzmasters got unconventional pickups was because of this. I remember in those days digging around in the parts bins behind the shop....piles of coffee cans and such, with the guitar tech to find a new saddle for the Floyd Rose. Offsets and Floyds were equal back then, except nobody really needed a new pivot for their Mustang, but those old beat up floyd guitars that were worn out from the 80's were hanging on the rack needing parts that nobody could get because the dealers did not sell them.
Internet sales were brand new, if you sent an E-mail to warmoth, it could take a few days still for them to answer. Internet forums loaded slow so we had conversations that remained idle for days at a time.
okay, I'll stop before I go on reminiscing too far.
My how much better the guitar parts industry is now than it was back then.
