How to place bridge

Benscience

Hi all,
I have been in the process of building this t style guitar and have finally completed the body and ready to put bridge on.. I have the string through holes drilled but not for the wilkinson 6 saddle bridge. Not sure what the next steps are to make it as accurate as possible. Any help very gratefully received.
Ben

SteveRobinson

Won't you have to align the string through holes already in the body with the holes in your bridge?

WezV

having the string holes already drilled changes things a bit - so try to work with what you have.

Put the bridge on so the string holes line up correctly.   Can you adjust the saddles so the distance between nut and high E saddle measure 25 1/2" inches (or double the distance from nut to 12th fret)?   Is there room to move the saddles back from this by at least 1/4"?  if so, you are good to go and can use the pre-drilled holes as a guide

If you are starting from scratch you measure from the nut to 12th fret and double the number to give you the scale length line.  You then adjust the saddles 3/4 - 7/8's of the way forward towards the neck and place the bridge so these sit on the scale length line.  This gives you plenty of backwards adjustment for intonation.   You also need to check the fit of other parts like the scratch plate.   Since tele's have quite a lot of adjustment you have a bit of room to comfortably move it for a better layout if needed

CasperCaster

Could you explain what type of bridge you have? If the string holes are already drilled in the body you really need to work with them and get a bridge to match. There are differences between the vintage Fender bridges, the modern Fender American standard bridges and some cheap third party bridges (the latter typically mount with 3 rather than 4 screws). I once had a Fenix telecaster with a 3 screw mount/ six saddle bridge which was designed to be used through strung or as a top loader. To save time/ money Fenix installed it as a top loader. I drilled holes through the body so it could be used through strung and it was fine. Then I thought I would change it for a vintage style bridge and nothing at all lined up - not the screw holes, not the string holes and not even the pickup rout! Lesson learned.....

Benscience

Hi all,
Many thanks for the advice. The bridge is a modern 6 saddle flat bridge. My other issue is that I am not using a pick guard and have been having difficulty with my lovely Oil a City neck pickup being attached directly into the body. How far down should it be screwed and do I need the springs under the pickup?  Both neck and bridge pickup are Oil City and now cannot wait to hear them. Anyway, thanks again.
Ben

Sambostar

Masking tape, pencil and a steel rule and a set square.  You can leave the neck loose and play around with it a bit, follow the line of the outside of the neck through the body, get a centre line, measure scale length.  You might not always want equal distance of the strings to the outside of the neck for high and low E, depending on how you play though.

I did this on an old strat and fitted a V trem plate, which I assumed was USA after measuring the scale length and finding it wouldn't intonate.  I supposed mocking up with a stratchplate helps as well.  So after dowel filling the holes and redrillling and widening the back rout, I also noticed the new plate was a bit off, so a USA plate probably would have done it after all, although I still would to have done the rout.