Official Luthiers Forum!

I just recently (last 2!) changed my guitars to a pinless bridge design but its always a challenge gluing the bridge without shifting from the correct place! Before I used 2 of the pin holes to screw the bridge in place temporarily while clamping and it worked like a charm but without the pin holes its real hard to keep the bridge from shifting
Does any one have a better method or suggestions?

thanks again....

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Peter M.
Cornerstone Guitars
http://www.cornerstoneukes.com

Peter, you can put 2 very small pins through the saddle slot. I use no. 40 drills.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

I'm probably going to try the tiny pins in the saddle slot method on my next, but so far I've had good luck with very carefully placed pieces masking tape strategically placed around the bridge outline. I build up three or four layers of the tape to make a positive stop, and carefully check to see that the bridge stits nice and snug in there before gluing. I've glued bridges with go-bars and with a vacuum clamp using this tape method, with excellent results either way.

On a side note, I use a spruce bridge plate with my pinless bridges. The main purpose of the bridge plate in this case is to help stabilize the top under the bridge, so that the cross-grain movement of the spruce (with changes in moisture content) doesn't cause the bridge to come loose at some future time.

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

Thanks Jim, I have thought about doing that....same concept as the regular bridges....I may have to do that!
Thanks

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Peter M.
Cornerstone Guitars
http://www.cornerstoneukes.com

[QUOTE=Jim_W] Peter, you can put 2 very small pins through the saddle slot. I use no. 40 drills. [/QUOTE]

Jim,

I presume the pins go through the bridge plate. How do you adapt the bridge plate caul for clamping/gluing?

Peter,

Like Todd I use low-tak masking tape built to make a template around the bridge. You have to be careful as you glue to make sure that the bridge doesn't slide over the tape anywhere and trap some between it and the top. Hide glue gives a bit more grip but you have the gel time factor to consider. After 10 minutes you can carefully peel up the tape (taking a lot of the glue squeeze out with it) and clean up around the bridge.

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Dave White
De Faoite Stringed Instruments
". . . the one thing a machine just can't do is give you character and personalities and sometimes that comes with flaws, but it always comes with humanity" Monty Don talking about hand weaving, "Mastercrafts", Weaving, BBC March 2010

Dave,
I currently vacuum clamp my bridges, I just put a small scrap of spruce over the saddle slot so the pins don't poke a hole in my vacuum sheet.
Before that however I just drilled a couple of holes small holes in the bridge caul for the pins to pass through. I use a fixture that locates the bridge from the nut with some pins that register the saddle slot in the correct location. This jig also has a couple of clearance hole in it for me to drill my pin holes, so I pretty much get them in the same place every time.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com