Floyd Floating Issue

Hey guys, I’m the guitar tech (dad) for a young shredder. He’s had Floyd rose equipped guitars for years with no issue. I’m always changing strings with him and I’ve never had a problem with D’Addario 10-46’s.

He recently wanted to try slightly smaller strings so we went with the Ernie Ball super slinky 9-42’s.

I knew this would be a pain with the Floyd, but I removed a spring, got the bridge in the correct floating position while tuning… stretched the strings… got everything setup correctly or so I thought…

Every time I try to out it through its paces to confirm tuning stability with the whammy bar the Floyd won’t rest back in its original position so the tuning is off. It’s got to be the springs in the back, but when I add the third I have to loosen the claw so much that I get the same problem. What gives?

Guitar in question is a dean VX that was just fine with the previous setup