unknown high mass bridge

[pRi3Mo]

I just aquired a beautiful natural blond Japanese Fender JB 70s style made back in the mid 80s. It came with an interesting bridge. I searched the net but couldn't find the thing. Also the Allen key nuts to lower the strings are incredible small. No idea which size they are. Maybe some of you guys can help me out. Who did this?

 

[ixlramp]

What are those clamps for on the lower 2 strings?

 

[walterw]

What are those clamps for on the lower 2 strings?

+1, those make no sense at all.

otherwise it looks like a nicely machined slab of brass, i wonder if it was just a one-off machine shop project?

 

[pRi3Mo]

This thing is heavy, too. Weights around 14 oz.
However it looks well crafted and it has kind of label in the middle. First letter is an "A". The other, I don't know. Could be a "9".
Those two clamps are supposed to hold down the E and A string. Doesn't make much sense to me either.
The reason I took the bridge straight off and switched back to a vintage fender bridge was because I noticed that the E string got pulled out a tiny bit too far. So it threatened the string to flip off the nut. After I released the string I figured that when played the force had already cracked the nut at the bottom where the E string rests. That's a downer.

 

[Arie X]

i think they are trying to increase ramp angle on those strings with the clamps.

 

[ixlramp]

I considered that too, like having adjustable break angle. But why only on the E , A when the D, G have the shallowest break angles? I guess it's possible that the higher mass of the E, A require more downforce, but i'm not convinced.
It's a very long bridge so increasing the break angle makes sense.

Hmm, maybe it allows clamping the string instead of using the ball-end, in order to pull a taperwound string back to minimise the length of the tapered section in the vibrating length? Or maybe since the bridge is so long, it allows moving a tapered string forwards to place the tapered section on the saddle?

 

[micguy]

Japan Fender style makes me wonder if it's a medium scale - if it is a medium scale, you might use the clamps to allow using regular gauge strings on it - clamping on the string well above the ball end, thus keeping the heavy wraps on the low strings fro going around the tuners? Just a guess. But you'd have the extra string length hanging out, so even that guess sounds like a strange idea.

 

[Arie X]

I considered that too, like having adjustable break angle. But why only on the E , A when the D, G have the shallowest break angles? I guess it's possible that the higher mass of the E, A require more downforce, but i'm not convinced.
It's a very long bridge so increasing the break angle makes sense.

Hmm, maybe it allows clamping the string instead of using the ball-end, in order to pull a taperwound string back to minimise the length of the tapered section in the vibrating length? Or maybe since the bridge is so long, it allows moving a tapered string forwards to place the tapered section on the saddle?

i've noticed that the bass strings tend to be very stiff at the bridge due to the wrap. usually not a big deal -just push the string down between the saddle and the ball to set a witness point but sometimes people try to fix things that often really don't need help.