This might be more appropriate for one of the luthier-oriented fora, but I thought I'd see if I could flog some life into the tiple forum, while I was at it. I am about the redo the nut and bridge saddle on my tiple colombiano. I put this off for a while, as I took some time to learn as much about this instrument as I could, and I am in better shape inthat regard now, than when I acquired it two years ago. As the saddle is a completely uncompensated straight line, I was planning on filling in the saddle slot, reslotting at an angle, and then compensating the saddle. The thing is, I'm not sure that I have enough space on the bridge platform to slant the saddle far enough to do a completely proper compensation. So, I started thinking that, since filling and reslotting is already a lot of work, maybe it's worth my while to do a whole new bridge? This would be a whole new challenge for me: although I've done plenty of saddles, and even a couple of reslottings, I've never before actually replaced the whole bridge on an acoustic instrument. StewMac promises they have all the tools I would need to do such a job... Then, as I started thinking about things like sideways tension and break angles, it occured to me that it might be a good idea to make the new bridge with holes for bridge-pins, like a 12-string guitar. This would allow me to get a more straight run of the strings over the saddle, and also a better break angle than the pull-through bridge. The thing is, every tiple I've seen, in person or in picture, has the pull-through bridge. This leaves me wondering whether there might be a compelling reason why that style bridge seems to be preferred on tiples. So, I'm wondering if anyone knows whether this is the case? And I'm also wondering if in really is a good idea to put a pinned bridge on an instrument that wasn't originally designed for one, since it does involve drilling holes through the top of the instrument. As always, any insights will be appreciated.
Hmm... not much activity over here. Where have all the tiplists gone?
