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Not only does the ATD-equipped Super-Matic tune you very accurately to pitch, it also offers five preset altered tunings.

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In an industry obsessed by the past, it's rare to get a guitar-based product that can truly be called forward-thinking. But, like those good ol' London buses, we get nothing for ages then two come along at the same time.

Recently we looked at the latest Variax digital modelling guitar from Line 6 and now it's the long-awaited ATD self-tuning bridge, here in its launch guise onboard Fret-King's Super-Matic guitar.

The ATDHT440 bridge isn't the world's first self-tuning bridge and similar technology is available from Gibson via its ongoing Robot series guitars.

The major difference, however, is that all the ATD's clever stuff is housed in a bridge that's designed to retrofit to an American Standard Series Stratocaster. It also needs a mini hex pickup mounted on the scratchplate in front of the bridge, which on its bass-side has the small lozenge-shaped LED readout and on the treble side a simple push-switch operating 'OP' button that accesses self-tuning and the unit's other functions.

"The mini hex pickup senses the pitch of each string, then tells the motorised gears how much they need to move."

The bridge looks only marginally techier than Wilkinson's VSV vibrato and uses a similar design for the six pressed stainless steel saddles, which feature a frictionless diamond coating.

Initially the guitar is intonated in the usual fashion, then once each saddle height is set they are individually locked. In the hollow centres of each saddle are the individual motorised gears.

In simple terms the mini hex pickup senses the pitch of each string and via some highly complex digital processing then tells the motorised gears how much they need to move to re-tune the guitar.