Ibanez RG Tremolo Components

The RG Tremolo series uses two necks: the Wizard II-7 and the Wizard III. Let's have a look at them.

• Wizard II-7
  Ibanez 5-piece Neck

  Like all the Ibanez Wizard necks, the Wizard II-7 is wide and thin with a virtually flat fingerboard. The Ibanez Wizard necks are famed for being an ultra-fast shredder's dream. The Wizard II-7 is the 7 string version of the Wizard II. The Wizard II-7 features a 5-piece Maple/Walnut construction with a bound Rosewood fingerboard with 24 jumbo frets, dot position inlays and a 25.5" scale length. The 5-piece construction technique provides a very strong durable neck because it has two pieces of walnut running the length of the neck sandwiched between three pieces of maple, also running the length of the neck.

  The remainder of the Wizard II-7's specifications are: 48mm wide at the nut, 68mm wide at the last fret, 19mm thick at the 1^st and 21mm thick at the 12^th fret. The fingerboard has a 400mm radius which is about as close to being totally flat as you can get.

• Wizard III
  Ibanez Wizard III Neck Back
  Again, like all the Wizard necks, the Wizard III is wide and thin with a virtually flat fingerboard and is a shredder's dream. The Wizard III is a 3-piece design featuring a wide "bubinga" maple strip in the center sandwiched between two pieces of maple on either side. The grain of the bubinga is perpendicular to the grain of the side pieces which makes the neck resistant to warping and very strong and stable. The Wizard III has a 25.5" scale length with fingerboards either of Rosewood for a slightly darker tone or Maple for a brighter tone. The fingerboards sport 24 jumbo frets with black dot position inlays on the Maple fingerboards and either pearl dot or sharktooth position inlays on the Rosewood fingerboards.
  Ibanez Wizard III Neck Sharktooth Inlays
  The remainder of the Wizard III's specifications are: 43mm wide at the nut, 58mm wide at the last fret, 19mm thick at the 1^st and 21mm thick at the 12^th fret. The fingerboard has a 400mm radius which. again, is about as close to being totally flat as you can get.

The Ibanez RG Tremolo guitars use two of Ibanez's innovative bridges: the Edge III and the Edge-Zero II with the ZPS3Fe spring system. Let's take a quick look at each of the bridges.

• Edge-Zero II w/ZPS3Fe
  Edge-Zero II w/ZPS3Fe
  The Ibanez Edge-Zero II is Ibanez's newest generation of knife edge tremolos. The Edge-Zero II is double locking which contributes to great tuning stability. The Edge-Zero II is basically an updated version of the Edge Zero. Like the Edge Zero it has a removable stop-bar/secondary spring, known as Zero Point System (ZPS3, carried over from the Ibanez ZR tremolo), which provides additional spring tension and thus extreme tuning stability. A really cool feature of the Edge-Zero II is that if you want a fully floating bridge, all you have to do is remove the stopbar.




• Edge III
  Ibanez Edge III Tremolo
  The Edge III is the first Ibanez Floyd Rose style double locking tremolo that wasn't licensed by Floyd Rose. Its design provides strength and extraordinary tuning stability even under the most demanding playing conditions. Lower profile tuners offer better palm comfort. In other words, if you have an aggressive playing style you aren't going to have to worry about having half the skin on your palm ripped off.
  
  
  Ibanez Edge III Torque And Height Adjusters
  A great feature of the Edge III is that it features two screws in the arm pocket that allow you to adjust both the height and torque of the tremolo arm.

The Ibanez RG Tremolo series uses two series of pickups: the Axis(AH) series of humbuckers and the INF(Infinity) series, which contains both humbuckers and single coils.

• AH27

  The AH27 is the 7 string version of the AH1 humbucker and is used in the bridge position. The AH27 has a full bass sound with Alnico 5 magnets providing excellent clarity in harmonics and individual notes.

• AH17

  The AH17 is the 7 string version of the AH1 humbucker and is used in the neck position. It provides a very responsive and full sound. It's a medium output pickup with lots of character and is great for chording.

• INF2

  The INF2 humbucker is used in the bridge position and has an enhanced midrange output. It sports Alnico 5 magnets for individual string clarity and has excellent dynamics.

• INFS1

  The INFS1 single coil provides nice single-coil snap thanks to Alnico 5 magnets and is designed to be used in the middle position with the neck and bridge humbuckers in the split position.

• INF1

  The INF1 humbucker is used in the neck position and has Ceramic magnets which make the INF1 very versatile and responsive with warm classic tone and added output.

• INF3

  The INF3 humbucker is typically used in the neck position. Ceramic magnets provide the dynamic sound needed for outstanding chording and rhythm.

• INFS3

  The INFS3 single-coil is used in the middle position and is designed to be used with the bridge and neck humbuckers in the split position. Thanks to Alnico 5 magnets the INFS3 provides the traditional single-coil sound but is still a high output pickup.

• INF4

  The INF4 humbucker is usually used in the bridge position. With Alnico 5 magnets, the INF4 is a brilliant lead pickup with a warm sound and great harmonics.

The last thing I want to cover is the pickup switching. The Ibanez RG Tremolo series guitars all have either a humbucker-humbucker pickup configuration(HH) or a humbucker-single-coil-humbucker configuration(HSH). All the Ibanez RG Tremolo models feature 5-way switching but it works differently for each pickup configuration. The switching combinations can be a little hard visualize so I wanted to give you a diagram(courtesy of the Ibanez official site) for each so that you can get a clear picture of each switching scheme. If you click on each diagram a bigger graphic will open in a new window.

• HH Switching
  

  One thing I want to clarify here is how the parallel configuration for the bridge humbucker affects the sound. When the coils are wired in parallel it effectively combines the output of the coils and doubles the output of the pickup.

• HSH Switching