Making
a compensated bone saddle |
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Once the original micarta saddle of
my Larrivée L-03R had developed a groove at the B string position, I
considered replacing it with bone. Many people swear bone would
refine the sound, so this option seemed desirable. I had ordered some bone
saddle blanks of different size and - that made the job easier - matching
thickness. I imagined making a simple saddle would be quite easy but how
about the B string compensation that was incorporated in the original
micarta saddle ? The intonation of my D-03R seemed close to perfect and I
did not want to spoil that.
Since I had to saw off a part of my blank in order to make the length
fit, I had a piece I could use. I figured I would glue some kind of
balcony to the rear (bridge pin) side of the blank. That's how I planned
and finally did the job: |
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This is how I planned to glue the balcony to the
main blank. I made sure that the piece glued on would not touch the bridge
itself thus reducing the pressure to the bridge. |
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I also made sure that everything was free of
dust or any kind of grease by cleaning both pieces with alcohol. The blank
was dead flat and had a semi glossy surface, so I did not have to do
anything to make the surfaces match. I glued the pieces together with
superglue and clamped them together for two hours. The result looked like
my drawing. |
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The I started filing the whole thing
into shape. Since the rim I had decided to be the bottom was straight from
the start, I worked only from the upper edge and left the bottom untouched.
The original micarta was the pattern I tried to approach. After a while
the result looked like this: |
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Well I detected that the upper edge
is not rounded the way shown in the drawing. Following the shape of the
original saddle I filed a form slightly different, but the B string
compensation looks close to what the picture shows. |
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This is some kind of a cross section
showing my compensation. Keep in mind the gap between bridge and the
saddle at the B string position. Finally the saddle fit in the bridge slot snugly but not too tight,
just like the original, as I checked comparing the both. The saddle does
it's job, the intonation is as perfect as could be. As for sound... Well I
did not really spot any difference. It might be the unwound treble strings
became a little bit smoother or warmer sounding, less brittle. But this
impression is as close to wishful thinking as it is to real observation. |
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This is how the real product looks from the player's
view, |
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from the opposite side ..... |
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And opposite to the top, a bit too narrow for my camera
to focus correctly. |
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