Yeah, so I broke the spring system in my whammy bar a few months ago, so I fixed my whammy bar using a fairly novel system: I opened up my controller, got a rubber band, and took advantage of all of the empty space in the controller to make the rubber band just tight enough to almost match the actual spring.
I still don't have GH3, though. I would've bought it for myself today, but I don't know whether or not I'll get it for Christmas. This is the only thing I don't like about the season.