Official Luthiers Forum!

Gentlemen,
What amount of compensation do you allow in determining the bridge position for an electric guitar, given a fairly low action and typical light or extra light guage strings?
I'm using a 25.5" Fender scale.
Also, given an adjustable bridge, how how far back would you set the default high E position (as well as the other string saddles) to allow a certain amount of reduction of compensation once everything's together and you're fine tuning??
Out of my normal element here.......

Thanks!!

Hi David.
Figure a rough compensation,
then make sure the bridge saddles have enough travel to accommodate that.
You,ve got a lot of latitude there.

The StewMac fretboard calculator will also give you the position of the bridge for proper compensation. It is interesting to me that different bridges have slightly different locations

http://www.stewmac.com/freeinfo/Frettin ... tcalc.html

When I built my Lester the value given by the SM calculator was a hair different than on the plans but I used it anyway and the saddles had enough travel to correctly compensate each string (ToM bridge)

what bridge are you using. I try and set it up with the adjustable bridge points near the front so that 80% is behind and 20 in front. That allows getting the strings all intonated .

_________________
John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it

Hello David;
I start with the high e setback at 2mm
2.5 got the b
3mm for the g if a plain string is used.
D-2mm
A-2.5mm
E-3mm.
I'll let ya know when I hear from Maria !!
Mike

_________________
Mike Collins