Bridge Replacement

[Tactician]

I have an Ibanez RD600 with the B400 bridge. In my opinion this has a design fault - an intonation adjustment screw to one side of the saddle piece and a height adjustment screw on the other. Although there is a little framework underneath the saddle, eventually that frame weakens and it slants over towards the unsupported side. The saddle design doesn't seem to be likely to ensure good sustain or tone from it. I think I may be able to change the saddles for a more traditional barrel type (like a std jazz bridge) from the B200 bridge. But failing that and looking at a complete replacement - my preferred option - Badass / Hipshot whatever - the problem is the B400 is sooo wide - 3 3/4 inches and screw-holes in each corner will have to be stopped or 'dummy' brass screw inserted into them.


Any ideas guys - my bass tech and I would be grateful.....

[pilotjones]

As far as sustain, if the saddles are making contact with the base plate on both sides of the string you should be OK- regardless of whether it's by direct contact or through a setscrew. The direct contact is probably preferred anyway.

So, as you raise the saddle fairly high, it angles sideways too much for your liking, correct? If that's the case, a cheapie solution might be, for the problem saddles (guessing the A & D strings, following the curve of the fretboard?) to make a shim to raise the non-setscrew side of the saddle.

[Bryan316]

I wonder if Hipshot A-Style bridge saddles would fit in there? The saddles have two set screws for height adjustment, then the string spacing set screw. As long as the saddles fit into each channel on your bridge, then they should swap easily.

If not, replace the whole bridge with a Hipshot A-Style solid brass bridge. Yeah, it'll take new mounting holes, so go buy some 1/8" dowel rods, drill out the old screw holes with a 1/8" drill bit. Then glue 1" sections of the dowel into each hole, and X-acto knife them flat once they're dried. Then you can cleanly locate, centerpunch, and drill the new bridge's mounting screws.

MAKE SURE that you're locating the bridge with enough room so the saddles can move forward and back as much as necessary to ensure enough range for setting intonation. You can do this by spacing the saddles in the bridge to kinda match where your saddles currently are, then hold the new bridge next to the still-mounted bridge to make some masking-tape reference lines as to where the new one will approximately go. That'll tell you if you need to mount it further in one direction or another, to assure the saddles rest balanced from high to low, and not sitting all the way forward or locked all the way back in the bridge.

[Tactician]

Well Peter, its like the underside of each saddle has a little deckchair arrangement - so the one height screw is in contact with the baseplate through the 'bracket' - on the otherside it's held up with this 'bracket'. I'd have designed this better when I was a 12 year old! The answer may be to get the saddles out of a Wilkinson, Gotoh or Schaller and fit those - they all have two height allen key screws as the intonation screw doesn't go right through the saddle, front to back. but far enough for some adjustment - you'd need to chneg the screw for a longer one or grid it off to make bigger adjustments - but that's prefferable to the Ibanez design.

[Tactician]

Woa! Brian - crossed in posts there - what you're saying is what I'm thinking in my last posting. As I'm aniticipating what you're suggesting, so I've given it to my guitar and bass tech, Tom Waghorn in Bristol (UK) - he's brilliant at this sort of thing and if it needs dowelling to fill holes left by the old bridge, that could be outside of a Hipshot or Badass baseplate, he'll do it so well they won't show.

[pilotjones]

Originally Posted by Tactician

Well Peter, its like the underside of each saddle has a little deckchair arrangement - so the one height screw is in contact with the baseplate through the 'bracket' - on the otherside it's held up with this 'bracket'. I'd have designed this better when I was a 12 year old! The answer may be to get the saddles out of a Wilkinson, Gotoh or Schaller and fit those - they all have two height allen key screws as the intonation screw doesn't go right through the saddle, front to back. but far enough for some adjustment - you'd need to chneg the screw for a longer one or grid it off to make bigger adjustments - but that's prefferable to the Ibanez design.

Sounds like you might be able to shim between the "deckchair" and the saddle, if I understand correctly.

[Tactician]

Hardly a shim at about 1/8 inch Peter

[pilotjones]

"Anything less than an inch is a shim. Over an inch, we'll call it a riser block." - machine builder's unwritten rule.

[pilotjones]

Here's another solution, which you may find attractive: add a form-fitting (hidden except for the edges) shim beneath the entire bridge, and then lower some or all saddles as appropriate.




You can call the shim a "tone plate," and then everyone will want one. (only half-joking)