New bridge question

[NUGGET]

Hi. I have a 99 Flatiron and believe I need to replace the bridge. I was experiencing an annoying ring on one of the e strings and had Maple Street Guitar take a look at it. He told me that the string slot in the bridge needed to be adjusted/reset. Anyhow; he attempted to fix it and now the string is a good 1/8" below the surface of the bridge. The ringing may be a little better but it is not fixed. I want to keep the mandolin as it was from Gibson so what kind/make of bridge should I use and where can I order one? I'm willing to attempt installing it myself but not quite certain how to cut the string grooves. Is this something that I should attempt or take it to a repair shop? Thanks for the help

[LongBlackVeil]

Get a cumberland acoustics bridge, no doubt about it, they're the best. They're also the only bridge I know of that be bought pre slotted.

[Ivan Kelsall]

Get a piece of thin card & on it,mark the positions of the strings as they are at the moment relative the the middle of the bridge.
That way, when you fit a new bridge,if it's un-slotted,you can then mark the string positions from the card onto the new bridge saddle. Don't worry too much about cutting the slots either,it's pretty simple to do. You just need a very sharp blade,a craft knife or (as i used) a scalpel will work fine. After marking the string positions onto the new bridge saddle,simply slide the blade of 'whatever' over it a few times until a groove appears.It's a good idea to cut the slots slightly downwards towards the tailpiece as well,as that will allow the strings to lie better. The slots for the E & A strings need only to be deep enough to stop the strings from sliding sideways,they'll soon cut their own string 'width' themselves. The slots for the D & G strings only need to be a bit deeper,as they too will soon cut their own slot width. It's better to cut too shallow than too deep. That's exactly the way i did it when i fitted a CA bridge to a mandolin that i once owned & it worked perfectly. There's no mystique in bridge fitting,it just needs a bit of thought & care.
One other thing that you might care to do if youfit a new bridge - when sanding the foot to the mandolin top contour,remove the bridge saddle (obvious) & sand it side to side,not,back & forth. That helps keep the foot 'dead flat' to the top with no chance of rounding off the front & back foot edges. As i recently bought a 'used' Ellis "A" style,i watched this YouTube clip & Tom Ellis (amongst a few others builders) does exactly that
Ivan

[HoGo]

If the rest of the bridge is decent, I'd just "cap" the saddle as I suppose all the slots are lowered deep into saddle. Plane the top of the saddle till you get rid of the slots, fit and glue small ebony piece to cover the missing wood. CA glue is best for this. Reshape the new wood to compnsation notches. You may leave the top holes closed if the posts are not too long (Actually I like the look of no holes on the top of the saddle). Put it back together and put proper slots in it.
Another alternative, especially if just one or two slots are messed, would be using just small patches of ebony under individual strings/pairs. Cutting U shaped notch and fill it with ebony piece with same grain orientation as the saddle.

[8ch(pl)]

I believe Gibson may have used Cumberland Acoustic bridges. I would go for one of those.

[bingoccc]

I have fighting that shrill E sting issue on my Kentucky 855 for sometime now. My most effective method is inelegant at best and still leaves me with less than the proper tone. I cut a very small piece of firm black rubber and put it under the E strings at the saddle. It doesn't really show but I've tried everything else, short of replacing the bridge, and nothing has worked. I shall watch this thread with great interest.

[mandroid]

Inlaying a little piece of bone in the bridge then slotting that piece is what I had done.

[darylcrisp]

Nugget
I may be mis-reading this, but if its only one or both of the e string slots at the saddle(on top of the bridge), and the rest of the strings are fine, i would fill that one or two slots, gently recut the slot and there you go.

The easy effective way to do this:

remove the bridge/saddle. use regular masking tape on the full front length and full rear length of the saddle. have the masking tape edge come above the string slots needed filling, about 1/8 of an inch. fill the slot/slots with some ebony wood dust(you can get this by gently sanding using xtra fine sandpaper on the front full edge and rear full edge of the bridge (the full length of the front side and full length of the rear-it will not change anything other than make the bridge a gram or two lighter-just take off enough dust to fill the slots-a couple passes of the sandpaper). put the dust in a small pile, pinch a bunch and place it in a slot-kinda tap the dust into the slot. now take thin grade crazy glue and using a toothpick-drop a very small drip on that slot-it should saturate the dust in the groove-let sit till hard-now gently file in a very shallow groove and there you go-adjust the groove depth as needed.

done this many a time for one or two low slots in bone and wood nuts/saddles.

good luck-and keep the crazy glue away from the rest of the mandolin-you'd be surprised how easy it is to splatter a drop and it always goes right on the front of the body where most noticable and leaves a permanent spot.

d

[Willie Poole]

I would just buy a saddle that is pre slotted, no use going through the hassle of fitting a complete bridge to the top