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Wilkinson wraparound bridge5/1/2023 This should also add some strenght to the final piece and will be a lot easier to make. It will be a two-piece thing, with a base piece anchored to the studs and providing the string anchoring and a top piece providing the intonation edge and fretboard arch glued on top. Wouldn't having the grain of the ebony running perpendicular to the strings make for a strong enough piece ? Locking posts or at least tight fitting "ears" to distribute the torsion forces over a surface as large as possible are probably a must. Myka latest example (the 335-ish spruce topped hollowbody) comes to mind. In terms of string anchoring it is not much weaker than some ebony tailpieces used on jazz-styled guitars. I still don't get the feeling that an ebony piece would be much more fragile than aluminum. It's got to be practical, so using the existing posts for adjusting action and set screws for intonation should be the way to go. Of course the challenge would be to do a drop-in replacement for an aluminum wraparound. Thanks for the feedback, obviously it is an interesting idea after all. Lot's of interesting discussion on the subject here. To prevent the string balls biting in I then flooded the holes with CA. In regards to string mounting, I was counter sinking holes on the under side, and slotting through the back edge so they could wrap around. But just wasn't the look I was going for. That greatly strengthened it in a very weak point. I also upgraded one cracked bridge with squares of sheet brass on the top and bottom of the wings. ![]() I have better things to do than carve out more bridges at about 3 hours a pop just for an experimental guitar that's already proved a theory. I use pretty heavy strings, and I'm not sure how long a wooden bridge will last with them. The most important thing I found was getting a good tight fit on the posts, if the wings are too thin, the bridge leans forward/up from a loose fit, it places the force over a much smaller area as only the edges of the posts will contact the wood, I broke one bridge that way.įor now I've put the idea on the back burner. ![]() Don't know a whole lot about it, but I imagine its stronger for the softer timbers. I think most people use 9's or 10's, so for them, I don't see any troubles, the strings I use have pretty hefty cores, and I think that adds even more tension than most.Īlso I think that the thorn bridge used that acrylic impregnated stuff too. I would take the thickness up a little, but a good hard wood should be able to take the tension at standard tailpiece thickness. I think they can be used with thicker "wings" on the bridge, as long as there is enough thread on the top half of the post. I've never used actual tonepros studs, but I had some from a wilkinson wraparound, which I think work the same way. With the u shaped cut out there's ALOT of endgrain in vital places. I think I saw a Thorn guitar with one like that. But after a series of impossible events, that guitar fell from quite a height, face down into a pool of dog urine, and well, nothing fares too well from that treatment.Īs far as strength goes, you'd be best doing it with tonepros studs, and having a hole for the stud, instead of the U shaped cutouts the bridges normally have. The second was sapele, it was okay, actually sounded good on the guitar, better than the aluminium one I had. That was made from an un identified australian timber. Was fine till that last string, I even stressed it to check, which in hindsight wasn't the best idea. ![]() 012-.050's on that guitar, which aren't exactly 9's. The first one, the grain suddenly split along the length of it as I tuned the last string from d to e, if i used a standard string set, it probably would have lasted a while. I made a couple of wooden wraparounds, both were good experiments, but eventually failed. Not sure if this is meant for a carved top guitar, if so it could still be done and teh bottom would have to be sanded to shape the way an archtop bridge is and it would need a bit more carefull planning I think it would have to be made oversize to compensate for the weakness around the studs and the extra depth from making it contact the body woud give the string holes a better chance of survival if they are positioned correctly. You're giving me some interesting ideas I may have to try out, though. Inlaying metal the full length might work (ie, let the metal take the contact points and distribute the stress along a wider/longer glue line). I'd worry (a lot) that the wood might break/fail at the studs, regardless of whether it's locked into place or not, with a bridge that small. There's a major, significant difference between a wooden wraparound (torsional and longitudinal forces) and an archtop-style wooden bridge+tailpiece combo.
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