Any advantage to this at all?

[Dave Bagwill]

John, I think it may be worth a try. I'll see what I can do and if I come up with something I'll run it here and see if it is tweakable. Thanks.

[Dave Bagwill]

Here's a quick and dirty.
First picture - The middle hole is in the standard position, no alteration. The hole to the left is 3/16", drilled straight down and a little further back than standard, and a string notch cut toward the saddle slot. The right hand hole is 3/16" drilled at about the slant I want the string to rest on as it exits, and a string notch cut toward the saddle slot.

The install process is: put the string into the hole about 2", to get past the windings, then move the string up into the string slot toward the saddle, so the ball end is free of the hole, then pull up. It is also easy to remove, just push the string until you're past the windings, then push to the hole and pull it out. Both holes worked well for that.

Second picture - self explanatory. The big question is whether the ball end will chew through that bridge plate too quickly.

Third picture - the string (this is the slanted slot which gives a better seating of the string against the slot in the bridge) shows the exit angle which can be altered a bit for more break angle.


Is it feasible, that's the question. It does provide, with the slanted slot, a goodly amount of bridge wood for the string to press down on, it gives the break angle you desire, it does eliminate bridge pins, and does make changing strings easier. With a little more care on my part, the slanted slot would be cleaner and give a good look to the bridge.

I've got no ego involvement here, so don't hold back on the suggestions!! I thank you for them.

[TonyinNYC]

I think it was Al Carruth or Mario Proulx who did an experiment regarding string break angle at the saddle. The conclusion was that the break angle, until it got to under 10 degrees, made no difference on tone or volume. Based on that, and Mario and Allen are both very well respected builders, I would say that the break angle you have is fine. I would be most concerned with the wear on the bridge plate. Since you don't have a pin to keep the ball end fixed, I would want to make sure the bridge plate was strong enough to handle the potential extra wear. I recently read a post from a builder on another forum where he flooded his bridge plate with CA before gluing it one. Obviously, you want to keep the CA off of the gluing surface that attaches to the sound board, but the idea has merit if you are using a softer and lighter bridge plate material.
If you use unslotted bridge pins, you can remove the pins once the strings have tension. What you are proposing is a similar style of bridge, but you are eliminating the pins. It is a pinned style of pinless bridge. Having given some thought to your idea, I think it is quite good. My only suggestion is to use a hard, HARD bridge plate material. Rock maple would probably work great.
At the end of the day Dave, you are not doing more damage to the bridge plate than any traditional pinned bridge would do. I just think it prudent to ensure against premature wear on the plate if there is any string vibration at the ball end.

How much do your bridges weigh? The lighter the bridge, the faster the response to a plucked string. My bridge design, in ebony, weighs about 26 grams. A typical Martin Belly bridge weighs 35+ grams. As you know, any weight you can shave off of the sound board makes a difference, so lighter is better.
I think you will have good results from this design once you flesh it out fully. Please keep us all posted.

[Dave Bagwill]

Does anyone know how much bridges on classical guitars weigh? They must be pretty minimal. Tony got me thinking about weight.
On weight and strength, what is the lightest wood we could use and keep enough strength to prevent the bridge splitting etc?
Some mfr's I understand are going to walnut for bridges, staining to get a good color match to the theme of the guitar, if there is a theme, and thereby saving some weight over an ebony or rosewood bridge.

[TonyinNYC]

You could try maple. I have 4 copies of my bridge in 4 different woods. All cut by CNC so they are pretty exact copies. The maple bridge weighs 11 grams versus 26 for ebony and 22 for eir. Mad rose is 24 grams.

[Dave Bagwill]

This is a pretty minimal bridge; if I was to make one WITHOUT the anchor block for the string ball-ends, I would end up with a light bridge.

Functionally, is there enough bridge there to actually work? I also attach a very complicated graphic.

[Herman]

Never heared of a deformed martin belly bridge, so I guess there is room for losing some meat. Who's volontering for making a bridge that could fail?