Re: refit bridge or leave it ?
I did actually post a reply yesterday,most of it making the same points that Tavy makes in his 3rd paragraph. Ideally,a bridge should fit to the top as perfectly as possible,however,i've often wondered whether a bridge needs to fit 100% perfectly - i suspect not.
As long as it fits as well as it might,given that a mandolin top may have discrepancies in it's curvature,then a slight mis-match such as the OP points out,might be more trouble than it's worth to put right,for maybe not very much (if any) improvement.
One thing that could be done however,is to glue a tiny sliver of wood to the bridge in the offending area,shape & sand it so that it fits the top more acurately. That would fill in the offending gap, & being so small,it shouldn't affect the tonal qualities of the mandolin at all. A hard wood such as Maple could be used & simply stained black on the edges (Felt tipped pen) to match the bridge,
Ivan
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