Finishing a bridge; likely more than youll ever want to know. The bridge is one of the most important parts of the guitar in terms of the sound, but it is also one of the most jewel like parts with lots of small details and intricate shapes. I think it is worth an up close look. Making bridges incorporates lots of techniques that have crossover into other kinds of fine woodworking and reminds me a lot of violin bow making. After taking a billet of rosewood, routing two carefully placed grooves in it and then drilling 12 tiny holes through the narrow side you begin to shape it with files, rasps, small saws, scrapers and a few other small tools. Then it gets to this point in the photos were the bridge is nearly done. The tie block part gets capped with a decorative swatch of wood and a border of thin strips of bone. In this case the wood is Snakewood, a heavy extremely hard wood that has patterning that looks like snakeskin. Nature go figure, it makes copies of itself. The bone border on the tie block is to prevent the strings from wearing out the holes. The edge of each wing of the bridge gets a chamfer, or angled cut to finish it off. Some makers devise elaborate systems of jigs to ensure this angle is perfect on both wings. Its actually not that hard to cut it and finish by eye, which is what I always have done. The bridge is also weighed as it is being finished. The flexibility and final weight of the bridge is absolutely crucial to the way it creates a link between the vibrating string and the top of the guitar. The bridge design and how it is glued onto the guitar coupled with its weight is an important factor in how the guitars voice works. This bridge ended up with a final weight of 19 grams. In the photo it weighs 21 grams, I pulled 3 grams out of it to get it under 20 grams. Bridges on flamenco guitars can weigh more or less, but I like just under 20 with very slightly flexible wings.
Posted on: Thu, 21 Aug 2014 03:21:56 +0000
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