Thursday, February 18, 2010
8:33 AM | Posted by
Donovan Banks |
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I never really liked the flying V so I advertised it for sale and I was traded a Samick strat style guitar for it. Value wise I reckon they're pretty much the same but the Epiphone has a more popular brand name. The Samick is a basic strat style guitar with two humbucking pickups and a floating Tremolo bridge.
I didn't really find time to play with the guitar much but when I did,
I found the D-string almost jumped out every time I used the trem. The guide at the bridge was broken and couldn't be held in place.
I obtained a new bridge hoping to just slot it in, but the plate was smaller than the current trem and it certainly wasn't going to be that easy. The next thing I thought I could do was to swop out all the guides.
The new bridge also had smaller screws to adjust the intonation which meant the gap in the "fork" was too smal for the screws in the existing bridge, and the small screws were too small for the holes in the old bridge as well.
This is the broken guide and the new one I put in. There are some very cool differences. The new guide is a string through, meaning I don't have to cut the ball end off to re-string. Although it doesn't have individual height adjusters like the old guides. I'm lucky the neck is fairly flat so it doesnt matter all that much.
There it is all done. The intonation, luckily, was spot on when I put the bridge on. The hardest part is adjusting the spring for the trem vs. the string gauge. Thankfully I've done that before and it was easier. It has a fatter neck than I thought it would but it plays very smooth and I can see myself enjoying it for a short while before selling it off.
I didn't really find time to play with the guitar much but when I did,
I obtained a new bridge hoping to just slot it in, but the plate was smaller than the current trem and it certainly wasn't going to be that easy. The next thing I thought I could do was to swop out all the guides.
The new bridge also had smaller screws to adjust the intonation which meant the gap in the "fork" was too smal for the screws in the existing bridge, and the small screws were too small for the holes in the old bridge as well.
This is the broken guide and the new one I put in. There are some very cool differences. The new guide is a string through, meaning I don't have to cut the ball end off to re-string. Although it doesn't have individual height adjusters like the old guides. I'm lucky the neck is fairly flat so it doesnt matter all that much.
Filed out to make it wider.
I filed the top down as well to give the screw more bridge to bite on. With the current height of that guide it only had less than 1mm to grip and I felt it could use more, especially at the tension and use I intend putting it through.
Thankfully this won't make a difference to the action or feel of the guitar. It made more mechanical sense to do this.
There's the bridge all together now.
Here you can see where the strings are threaded. It definitely makes restringing much easier.
I'm GASsing for an Ibanez S Series... mmmmm
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About Me
- Donovan Banks
- Durban, KZN, South Africa
- I am a musician who does anything and everything else. I write about what I do and how I do it. Enjoy and feel free to comment.
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