Official Luthiers Forum!

Does or has anyone glued saddles into bridges. Wondering if anyone has noticed any tonal difference between gluing and not gluing ?
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

I am not aware of anyone who does this, Tom.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Martin has always glued in this style saddle -- a real PIA to remove

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

I can't imagine any 'tonal improvements' that would outweigh the total pain in the butt it would be.

Ed: I do know as Ken says that Martin has glued in through saddles but was not sure of drop-ins. One may suppose that better transmission..................less impedance would be the result.
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

When we reglue through saddles, it's with hide glue...a little heat and a foil and cardboard mask around the bridge and they come right out. Martin now uses CA to glue, which is why the job went from 5 minutes to get one out to 30-45 minutes. What were they thinking?

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A constellation only takes shape when one maps the whole.
- Beth Brower

My bad. Never really messed with through saddles.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

Repair guys will curse you and your children if you do this.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

If you have a bridge that has broken in front of the saddle, then gluing in the saddle after regluing the bridge can add some strength and possibly keep it from breaking again.

And I have, the entire Martin family including their parents, and children's children!

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If what you see is what you get, then Stevie Wonder ain't got nothin'!

If you have a bridge that has broken in front of the saddle, replace the bridge with a new one.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

What Chris said - saddles are not intended to be structural, static, non-serviceable, glued in place for ever more..... parts of a guitar.... Instead saddles need to be serviceable and that means accessible, removable without unnatural acts, etc.

Using a saddle glued in place to repair a split bridge is not a good idea..... Instead replace or if appropriate repair the bridge independent of the saddle. Replacement is more often than not the way to go with a split bridge unless there are other compelling reasons why to we might want to preserve the original. It's that ole "appropriate for the instrument" thing again.

Regarding glued saddles it's always, or usually if there is enough saddle proud of the bridge top possible to reshape the saddle on the guitar and glued into the bridge. Although not ideal and not a solution for a taller saddle requirement you can lower a saddle and even add compensation where there was none before. I just did this to a very nice Martin Thursday with a glued in saddle. Instead of removing the saddle and swearing out loud several thousand times I simple did the math, reduced the saddle height to where I wanted it, carved in some compensation with my favorite 1/2 round OOO file, sanded with 320, taped off the saddle and presented the entire thing to our nut... buffer and called it good. Easy peasy, next.

If the saddle is too short and glued in place working it in place is the least of your concerns, the instrument likely needs a neck reset.

TIP: Diamond fret crowing files will also impart a non-compensated crown on a saddle. For instruments without compensation this can be an option.

"If you have a bridge that has broken in front of the saddle, replace the bridge with a new one."

This is a lot more work, and for some instruments it is hard to justify the extra expense.

"I do know as Ken says that Martin has glued in through saddles"

Some major manufacturers have done this - possibly to avoid some warranty work. Not a great thing for original construction, but as a save for some instruments I think it is justified. As Woodie G mentioned some glues are more appropriate than others.