glider Posted March 21, 2014 Share Posted March 21, 2014 i have a really neat gibson b 25. love the feel of the guitar, the sunburst and vintage aging of the instrument (1966). it has a a rose wood bridge and rosewood adjustable saddle. any way to beef up the tone. its a bit thin sounding for my liking.... want to keep her but find my self playing my martin 000-17sm more as its a deeper sounding guitar... any helpful hints Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blindboygrunt Posted March 21, 2014 Share Posted March 21, 2014 ERM...give the Gibson to me?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobouz Posted March 21, 2014 Share Posted March 21, 2014 i have a really neat gibson b 25. love the feel of the guitar, the sunburst and vintage aging of the instrument (1966). it has a a rose wood bridge and rosewood adjustable saddle. any way to beef up the tone. its a bit thin sounding for my liking.... want to keep her but find my self playing my martin 000-17sm more as its a deeper sounding guitar... any helpful hints Experiment with strings. Try to find one of the old ceramic saddles & swap out the rosewood. Replace the plastic bridge with rosewood or ebony (and a bone saddle). None of these are guaranteed to make a significant difference. Contrary to what one would logically expect, I replaced the bridge on a '65 B-25 with ebony, and actually preferred the original tone. Haven't tried the ceramic saddle swap, but eventually will be doing so on a '66 Epi Cortez I currently own (different peghead & pickguard, but otherwise the exact same guitar). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zombywoof Posted March 21, 2014 Share Posted March 21, 2014 You hear it said all the time that sound is 90% the player and 10% the guitar. But that 10% really matters. What you are talking about is tuning the guitar's voice. In my experience swapping strings, saddles, nuts, and all that stuff will not make much of a noticeable differene. The only way to really get you where you want would be to remove the top and mess with the bracing - either radius it or re-taper the ends, shift it towards the soundhole or whatever. Or possibly replace the oversized bridge plate which I believe is spruce in the B-25 and go with a traditional smaller maple bridge plate. Not saying you should not experiment with different guage strings or saddle material or even maybe something like removing the pickguard (which is pretty thick on those guitars). It is something you can do yourself and is not all that expensive. But you know that saying about the leopard not being able to change his spots. Your guitar has a voice which is the combination of everything that went into it and how long it has been on this moretal coil. There is really not that much you can do short of major surgery that will dramatically change its voice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jedzep Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 I'm one of those guys who tried to change the 'leopard's spots' on this very model, and managed to convince my ears that I improved it's tone. After unhappily trying ceramic for a while, I removed all the adj stuff and cut up an old rosewood bridge to shape a form fitting piece that included the traditional 1/8 inch saddle slot to fit snugly into the adj bridge opening. Put a bone saddle in and liked it better for balance, but it never 'beefed up' the tone. Changing strings, picks, and strumming hand technique honestly did as much, so don't make yourself crazy over it. I passed mine along to buy a '56 LG2, a great guitar and more 'beef', but apparently not quite enough. I had to go with the elder L00 to get depth in a small bod. I'm a relatively quiet picker/strummer, so I depend on textural variations to get where I'm going. I'm wondering if I never changed the B25's tone at all, for all the screwing around. The brain wants what the brain wants. There was something soft and pleasant sounding about the rosewood saddle, as I recall. Back to square one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aliasphobias Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 Frank Ford, frets.com has some interesting views on the adjustable saddle guitars. The article is replacing the bridge on a Hummingbird. Get a mirror and take a look at the bridge plate, many were oversized and plywood. Frank ended the article by saying if you don't think removing mass from the bridge will improve tone and volume try this simple experiment: take a guitar that you like the sound of, pluck an open string then pluck an open string and touch the handle of a kitchen knife to the bridge or saddle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zombywoof Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 Changing strings, picks, and strumming hand technique honestly did as much, so don't make yourself crazy over it. Bingo - changing how you approach a guitar will probably result in the biggest change you will hear. I have been trying to make peace with archtops for decades. I could not get a sound out of them I liked no matter what I did. Then a guy I know who has been playing archtops since dirt gave me a bit of advice telling me I could not approach them like I did a flattop and just flail away at them. They responded better to a lighter touch. Darn thing is he was right. Just being a bit gentler with them made a big difference. Problem is I guess I am just unwilling (or maybe unable) to change my spots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zombywoof Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 Do threads like this make anybody else feel old when you have trouble thinking of a guitar made in 1966 as "vintage." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j45nick Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 Do threads like this make anybody else feel old when you have trouble thinking of a guitar made in 1966 as "vintage." I find it difficult to envision anything made during my sophomore year in college as being "vintage". But then I look in the mirror..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jedzep Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 I find it difficult to envision anything made during my sophomore year in college as being "vintage". But then I look in the mirror..... I replaced all light bulbs with 15W. It helped with the mirrors, but now I can't read song lyric sheets and lord knows I can't remember 'em. 'I may not be good looking, but at least I ain't got no money'. If you know where that line comes from, brother, you're vintage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B1ues Boy Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 I bought a 70s Gibson Gospel guitar off the crazy lady a few years back...I was in her living room she had a 4 ft pile of trash in the middle and sticking out of the trash was from what I could see was grover tuners so I peeked around the front and seen Gibson on the head stock I ask her if I could pull the guitar out of the pile and she said yes, so I gave it a big tug and this guitar was full of trash, coffee grounds and a big crack all along the pickgaurd from the bridge to the neck, it was so bad that it was lifting and the bridge had a huge crack and was lifting too.... I asked if she would want to sell it to me and she said it's trash just take it, I insisted she take $20 and she did so I took this Gospel guitar down to my local guitar shop and had it fixed It cost around $350 to replace the adjustable bridge and steam and glue the big crack....when I got the guitar back it looked horrible but the sound was so good it sounded better then my Santa Cruz Brazilian Rosewood D BTW the Gospel had a slim neck and played like butter I wonder how many of these old Gibson's with this adjustable bridges would benefit the sound with replacing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jedzep Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 Good story! Santa Cruz makes nice tight flat tops. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CAMELEYE Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 When all else fails a J-45 will beef up a B-25. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jedzep Posted March 22, 2014 Share Posted March 22, 2014 When all else fails a J-45 will beef up a B-25. Yeah, by at least 2G's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
6stringTom Posted March 23, 2014 Share Posted March 23, 2014 i have a really neat gibson b 25. love the feel of the guitar, the sunburst and vintage aging of the instrument (1966). it has a a rose wood bridge and rosewood adjustable saddle. any way to beef up the tone. its a bit thin sounding for my liking.... want to keep her but find my self playing my martin 000-17sm more as its a deeper sounding guitar... any helpful hints I have a '65 Epi Cortez--same as a B25 (see Babouz post above). Mine has the plastic adjustable bridge and ceramic saddle. It's not a powerful guitar, and I didn't expect it to be. Relative to its size, It does have the strong fundamentals and midrange characteristic of Gibson mahogany guitars, but it pales next to my J-45 as it should. The Cortez is perhaps my favorite couch guitar--easy to hold, easy to play, and sweet sounding in its own way. I think it's easy to mistake heavy overtones for power, especially in a small body guitar, where it can be surprising to hear so much complex sound coming from a small box. When I want that rich complexity, I turn as you do to a Martin 000, in my case a rosewood, although I have an all mahogany 000 that also has a deeper sound than the Cortez. For sheer power, the J-45 is the choice. All this is to say that whatever you may decide to do, if you can't appreciate the B25 for what it is, you may eventually want to trade it for a guitar designed for the sound you want. You might be surprised that changing strings or using a heavier pick (if flat picking) or simply a stronger attack does the trick for you, especially if the sound you want is more of a tweak than a basic change. Maybe right now your ears really love the Martin sound. Maybe in two months the B25's strengths will hit you and you'll play the heck out of it for a while. Of the simple changes you could try, I suggest heavier strings. Start with medium lights, then go up to mediums if you're not satisfied. You might also try Newtone round cores or monels. (I tried DR round cores and thought they sounded terrible, but YMMV). A luthier told me these are very heavily built, so if yours is structurally sound, heavier strings should be ok. Ask someone who knows your guitar if in doubt about that. There are a lot of really nice small body guitars out these days, so if you decide to change there will be plenty of options. Good luck, and keep us posted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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