Well, today was a busy day
Since I couldn't find a small enough bridge to fit I decided to mod the one that came stock with my SX Jazz 5. Used a dremel tool and a thin cone attachment to open up the B, E, and A string holes. The B took a little more work than I would've liked, but I guess you can't always get what you want
Anyways, 1st thing I did was tape around the bridge as a guide:
I basically wanted to move the bridge back about 10mm so that I could properly intonate my low B and give a little more room behind the E saddle. I then measured 10mm (I would've like to move it 12, but I didn't feel like getting new screws for the saddles) and marked the tape:
I also managed to save some string costs
The other thing I made sure to do is measure the saddle positions and add 10mm. I mostly did this cus I didn't want to nick one of the springs with the dremel. That would've sucked
I removed the saddles and kept everything together with masking tape. I even wrote the string #s on it. I was really uber-organized lol:
The next thing I did, before grinding out the bridge holes was to fill the holes with glue and toothpicks. Kept everything really snug, and was able to let it dry really well while I was working on the brige:
Unfortunatly I forgot to take before and after pics of the bridge's string holes. I prolly had to make the low B hole about a mm bigger all round. I made sure to go slow and kept the B string with me to periodically check that it would fit, and that the ball end wouldn't just sail on thru
One thing I didn't want to do is fill the 2 front bridge holes with glue/toothpicks cus it would look a little tacky. I instead filled em with a couple of screws that were from my other basses endpins when I changed em to shaller (iirc) straplocks. I did the same thing with the holes left over from the string tree. It pissed me off and caught on the strings causing tuning issues:
Heres a pic of the bridge with the front screws and fill screws in place:
My dad actually came thru the door at this point and we pre-drilled all the holes and stuff. Im actually very thankful cus I don't think I would've been able to do it myself. Well, I prolly could've winged something, but it was a lot faster doubling up on it
Next I put the saddles back on useing the previous measures, adding 10mm. I kept the low B at the previous distance cus it was OK for getting the string on, but the intonation was off. Basically adding 10mm to it makes the intonation
perfect. Actually all my measurements were accurate and the intonation on all the other strings is the same as before:
I then whipped out my tuner:
The bridge holds beautifully, and I managed to get all the old strings to fit. I meant to pre-drill then put the saddles and strings on
before screwing the bridge on, but in hindsight Im glad I put the screws in then the saddles and strings. It was just easier that way:
Heres a couple of pics of the entire bass after the mods. Im thinking of getting some new knobs that
don't say "volume" and "tone". Sorta snazz it up a little.
I've yet to play it thru an amp, so I could've totally screwed up something and not know it lol....
Anyways, for 16$ (cost of the dremel and the bit) I can't complain, and I just thought I'd post it up for anyone interested in doing the same
