J45 Modification / sloted, ramped, solid pins

[Tim Tim]

I slotted the bridge on my J45 Banner Historic.   No-brainer; superior long term design.  (I’d slot the bridge on any Gibson I was planning to keep.).  Break angle is good, so ramping is unnecessary.  

[fortyearspickn]

16 hours ago, j45nick said:

There is no ramping in the  Dave F's drawing. The ramping on the OP's bridge modification is the long, angled string slot in the bridge between the pins and the saddle that allows the string a steeper angle to the saddle, compared to the un-ramped arrangement shown in Dave F's drawing.

Both of my Bozeman Gibsons have very slight ramps cut in the bridge, which were done at the factory to the best of my knowledge. On older Gibsons, you often see "natural" ramps worn into the bridge by decades of string changes, tuning, and playing.

The problem with older guitars with slotted pins is that there is inevitable wear and tear in the pinholes from the ball end of the string pulling into the bridgeplate, no matter how careful you are.

When Ross Teigen did bridgeplate pinhole repairs on what is now my primary (and virtually completely original) 1950 J-45 a few years ago, he suggested it was a good time to slot and slightly ramp the bridge, and make the move to unslotted pins, to minimize bridgeplate damage in the future.

That is a really good thing to consider on Gibsons from the late 1940s and early 50s that have softer spruce bridgeplates, which can get badly worn over time.

I bought the files and saws from Stewmac to do this to my other  1950 J-45, which has a pretty lousy break angle and a new maple bridgeplate and new Brazilian bridge. Since that guitar has a number of unoriginal features, I don't have any real concerns about another small modification which may actually improve tone.

Your experience may vary.

Yep.  I agree, there is no ramping on Dave F's drawing.   My point was that I would not cut a channel or slot into the bridge for ramping, nor would I cut a channel or slot or slit into it and the face and the bridge plate for the string between the ball ends and where the turn for the saddle starts, either in a ramp channel or at the 90 degree edge of the bridge.   I tend to accept what the maker designed - like you, my three Bozemen's have slight  'ramps'.  More like notches I'd say - to keep the string in the correct spot. Like 1/16" maybe, half the diameter of the string. 

I was mostly just commenting on the point by  the OP that he had his Bozeman J45's notch increased in size to a ramp so he'd have a better break angle, which to me is very different than a placement notch,  as you said - a long, angled string slot.    As I wrote, I may be in the minority - but unless there is a problem like you've had on your older guitars, caused by decades of wear - I'm not going to cut anything -  channels, slots, ramps, slits or reams into my bridge, face or bridge plate .   But then - I'm also in the segment that doesn't see the merit in drilling into the heel for a strap button, so that's where I'm coming from.  Risk averse !   Years back we'd had posts on here from folks who modified (shaved) their bracing to tweak the tone -  I guess I would just buy a different guitar. 

[philfish]

OP here, having had this mod done on two other guitars. I found string changing and pin fit the most beneficial of this procedure.

When changing strings, I put a small bend at the ball end then insert the string in the pin hole and keeping the string in the slot of the bridge I then pull the ball end up to the bridge plate, I can feel when the ball has made contact with with the bridge plate. Then I insert the bridge pin. ie  I feel the ball end contact better with a slotted bridge than a non slotted bridge or slotted pin 

Thanks for the comments on the guitars looks, It sounds great to. 

And yes I guess it's been pimped 😃 

[j45nick]

1 hour ago, fortyearspickn said:

Yep.  I agree, there is no ramping on Dave F's drawing.   My point was that I would not cut a channel or slot into the bridge for ramping, nor would I cut a channel or slot or slit into it and the face and the bridge plate for the string between the ball ends and where the turn for the saddle starts, either in a ramp channel or at the 90 degree edge of the bridge.   I tend to accept what the maker designed - like you, my three Bozemen's have slight  'ramps'.  More like notches I'd say - to keep the string in the correct spot. Like 1/16" maybe, half the diameter of the string. 

I was mostly just commenting on the point by  the OP that he had his Bozeman J45's notch increased in size to a ramp so he'd have a better break angle, which to me is very different than a placement notch,  as you said - a long, angled string slot.    As I wrote, I may be in the minority - but unless there is a problem like you've had on your older guitars, caused by decades of wear - I'm not going to cut anything -  channels, slots, ramps, slits or reams into my bridge, face or bridge plate .   But then - I'm also in the segment that doesn't see the merit in drilling into the heel for a strap button, so that's where I'm coming from.  Risk averse !   Years back we'd had posts on here from folks who modified (shaved) their bracing to tweak the tone -  I guess I would just buy a different guitar. 

I don't really disagree with you.

The work to the bridge that Ross Teigen did on the bridge of my 1950 J-45 is very subtle, much less pronounced than that shown on the OP's bridge in this thread.  In my case, the pin holes already had "string wear slots" on top of the bridge,  so all he did was a clean-up and tiny bit of ramping. On that guitar, the pin holes are quite close to the saddle, so the break angle is really good.  I also had him slightly over-set the neck, since he was doing a neck re-set at the same time.

My other 1950 J-45 has a replacement bridge that he did--it's a complicated story--but the result was a long distance between pins and saddle, and a really mediocre break angle.  The new bridge was a re-convert to the original 1950-style bridge from a 1968 belly-down bridge with an adj saddle, keeping the same pinhole location. To get the intonation right, the saddle ended up being well forward on the bridge, resulting in a poor break angle.

That guitar has had so many mods over the 55 years I've owned it--including re-topping by Gibson in 1968--that I am less reluctant to fiddle with things.