Where to get half barrel saddles for a bridge?

[The Crusader]

Where to get half barrel saddles for a bridge?

I just picked up a Sadowsky Metro that has half barrel saddles on the bridge, you know, not fully round, flat on the bottom, henceforth, able to bring the action down a bit more if you wanted to.

I'd like to find some more of these bridges or just the saddles for some other projects that I have. any ideas?

[The Crusader]

um, hello? anybody out there?

[JustDavid]

If a cheap bridge, I'd just grind down the round ones already on it.

[ByF]

Round saddle + flat file = half saddle

[The Crusader]

looks like we're going to the bench grinder

[rumblethump]

If you are not able to lower your bridge enough it means you will need to shim the bottom of the neck pocket. Start with two business card thickness shims. Over half the basses I've received have needed shims to get the setup right. Very easy fix and it doesn't goober up the bridge.

[JustDavid]

Not saying your solution isn't a good one but, other than possible resale issues, why not flatten the bottom of the saddles?

[rumblethump]

I'm just trying to point out that this is a common problem that has a solution that doesn't require grinding up your bridge. If you want to do shade tree work, please go right ahead. Just not on my bass.

Adding shims to the neck is very common and easy to do. It just takes a bit of experimentation to figure out how many thicknesses of shim material will be needed to fix it. Set necks and neck through don't apply here.

[JustDavid]

Some view the usual method of neck shimming as "shade tree work", preferring a properly angled wood shim for the entire area of the neck pocket. & yeah, neck-throughs are a bugger to shim

I was more digging into possible reasons to not grind down the bottom of the saddles.

[rumblethump]

"Some view the usual method of neck shimming as "shade tree work" ????

That is news to me. Please, give me an example of this line of thought? Link maybe?

With shimming the neck, at least the bass can be restored to original condition if necessary.

What it appears you are saying is go ahead grind up a bridge instead of fixing it properly? What if grinding the bridge doesn't lower the action enough. Would you recommend the OP now route the bridge into the body? Now you have an unplayable bass that needs a new bridge. When shimming will fix the problem and no parts are being destroyed.

[JustDavid]

The example is in my post: a properly-angled wood shim. It's been raised in here in more than a few shimming discussions as a better method than a piece of card stock in the hell of the pocket. I don't have any links but I doubt all the threads have been deleted.

My own preference would be to shim the neck in the usual way. & perhaps I should have added that as an option when responding to OP's question. But I didn't, & someone else did.

I merely inquired, politely I thought, into what reasons you had for not grinding the saddles. I'm sorry it was taken offensively. As you pointed out, there are times when it might be the best method, like glued-in & neck-throughs.

[Nino Valenti]

Shim the neck.

[Jo6Pak]

I would be interested in some flat-bottom saddles my damn self...

[The Crusader]

Originally Posted by Nino Valenti

Shim the neck.

nino, certainly there must be a reason why they are used on the metros,no?

[mongo2]

Originally Posted by Nino Valenti

Shim the neck.

+1

[Nino Valenti]

The bridge on the Metros and NYCs are the same and there are instances that the NYCs are shimmed as well.

[The Crusader]

Originally Posted by Nino Valenti

The bridge on the Metros and NYCs are the same and there are instances that the NYCs are shimmed as well.

I don't disagree, but I've never seen a bridge with "half" barrels on an NYC

edit: unless, I never noticed before, which after viewing some other threads, seems to be the case how embarressing