Bone saddle on floating bridge?

[ptchristopher3]

Hi Ron,

What is the height of the E strings above the top at the front edge of the bridge?

[RonD]

Hi Ron,

What is the height of the E strings above the top at the front edge of the bridge?

Hi Chris,
It's 5/8" on both.

[ptchristopher3]

Hi Chris,
It's 5/8" on both.

Ah, so that is right down there. Not a playability problem at all in my opinion, but a squeeze as you already noted for a TOM and a base.

Great to hear that life looks good at this point. Sorry about the experience with the poseur. They can appear in the oddest of places (throat clearing sound,...).

In my opinion, 3/4” is really as low as you want to go when there is to be a bridge and base involved. Once you have a bridge sitting on studs screwed into a center block or solid body, then of course lower can - and does - work.

On the other end, once you get notably over about 1” you can run into other issues. The bridge or base can be made taller easily enough - just look at classical stringed instruments. But some pickup types are awkward to mount extremely high (Gretsch Filtetrons come to mind), and for some players having the strings very high off the top can be awkward depending on how the player orients their picking hand.

Thanks very much for the details on this, and great to hear that it looks to be working out well.

Chris

[ptchristopher3]

Thinking about playability with a lower bridge height, consider the beloved and beplayed Telecaster.

Typical clearance above the full-coverage pick guard (thus, in effect, the top) can be around 1/4”.

So long as the bridge mass is working well for your sound, 5/8” is positively towering compared to a Telecaster.

Fuzzy pics, but the workmanship looks rather good on your custom job.

Chris

[RonD]

Thinking about playability with a lower bridge height, consider the beloved and beplayed Telecaster.

Typical clearance above the full-coverage pick guard (thus, in effect, the top) can be around 1/4”.

So long as the bridge mass is working well for your sound, 5/8” is positively towering compared to a Telecaster.

Fuzzy pics, but the workmanship looks rather good on your custom job.

Chris

Hi Chris,
The basic shell of the guitar is good.
The biggest issue, for me, is the neck angle.
The original tailpiece, see pic, was too long and too thick to provide enough break angle at the bridge.
The cheap shorty that's on there now, seems to help.
I also had the frets dressed to help with some fingerboard wonkiness.
That's when we discovered that frets 12-15 were different fret wire?? Wider than all the rest!

Thanks again for all of your input.
It is truly appreciated.

Cheers, Ron

[Jabberwocky]

That looks nice, RonD. Who made it? It has a bit of Sadowsky, a bit of Collings, a bit of Benedetto, a bit of Gibson in it. I even dig the headstock.

[RonD]

That looks nice, RonD. Who made it? It has a bit of Sadowsky, a bit of Collings, a bit of Benedetto, a bit of Gibson in it. I even dig the headstock.

PM sent.

[coolvinny]

I had the ebony nut on my Andersen laminate Vanguard replaced with a bone nut by my local luthier - frankly I had no idea the original nut was ebony! I was trying to brighten my tone through my 12" open back SS amp which due to my strings/pick/HB was on the dark side of tone. Anyways, the local luthier suggested I could also try a bone saddle insert for the floating bridge - I decided to have a new saddle made from scratch including a bone insert so that I could easily do some A/B-ing with my old one.

After about a year now, I have settled on the one with the bone insert. It gives me a bit more definition out of the wound strings and also seems to provide a more "even" volume string to string including when amplified. The low strings, although a bit louder it seems now, seem to be slightly less prone to feedback now (never a big problem but sometimes it was on big chord melody type passages).

It's not a terribly expensive experiment to have a local luthier/tech make a new saddle with a bone insert for an existing floating bridge. I think mine cost around $100 or $125.

[RonD]

I had the ebony nut on my Andersen laminate Vanguard replaced with a bone nut by my local luthier - frankly I had no idea the original nut was ebony! I was trying to brighten my tone through my 12" open back SS amp which due to my strings/pick/HB was on the dark side of tone. Anyways, the local luthier suggested I could also try a bone saddle insert for the floating bridge - I decided to have a new saddle made from scratch including a bone insert so that I could easily do some A/B-ing with my old one.

After about a year now, I have settled on the one with the bone insert. It gives me a bit more definition out of the wound strings and also seems to provide a more "even" volume string to string including when amplified. The low strings, although a bit louder it seems now, seem to be slightly less prone to feedback now (never a big problem but sometimes it was on big chord melody type passages).

It's not a terribly expensive experiment to have a local luthier/tech make a new saddle with a bone insert for an existing floating bridge. I think mine cost around $100 or $125.

I see you're in Canada. Where about and who's your luthier?

[coolvinny]

I see you're in Canada. Where about and who's your luthier?

I'm in Vancouver and I've been using Nicole Alosinac since 2016 or so. She does excellent work and she also provides very good advice.

[Hammertone]

Nicole is great - everything from simple setups to guitar restoration. One of Canada's best.