Repairing collapsed bridge stud inserts.

The wood that holds the bridge stud inserts upright has broken forward, and the bridge has began to tip. You can usually tell something is wrong when the bridge starts to rub or overlap the pickguard. We often see this happen on guitars that have had Floyd Rose bridges retrofitted into them and on Strat Plus 2 stud bridges. Many times there just is not enough wood in front of the insert to hold the studs in place or the wood is soft Alder or the holes have been oversized .......

There are a few ways to skin this cat (ouch) In this repair we pulled the studs and glued up all of the broken wood. We pressed the studs back in but had to come up with a way to keep it from breaking forward again. We countersunk a flat piece of graphite in front of the bridge stud inserts to hold them in place and put in some long screws deed into solid wood to hold it in place. This is a very solid repair and have not seen any fail.

Fender Jaguar / Jazzmaster Mastery Guitar Bridge

from the front

from the top

Building on the already spiffy Fender Jaguar is a small company called "Mastery" which, if the hype can be believed, supplies the Best Bridge Going for this popular guitar. Strings don't slip around in the saddles and the bridge doesn't rock back and forth in the body. Notes played on a guitar using this bridge are fuller and clearer. Subjective opinion, of course, but we're like that. This piece of hardware is solid as a rock. And, it comes with a handy stash bag for your chronic.

Check 'em out: www.masterybridge.com.

the old one

the stash bag

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