Shaving saddle

thomasross20 · September 2022

Anybody done this or would recommend getting done by luthier?

Tannin · September 2022

Why not get a professional to do it? It will cost you the price of a couple of pints and you'll get a better job and you will make a useful contact.

thomasross20 · September 2022

Yep... Just emailed a luthier I use. Going to get it done right!

drofluf · September 2022

Yes, and I would recommend getting a luthier to do it properly unless you have a stock of spare saddles.

thomasross20 · September 2022

Thanks, guys!
The quote was very decent, it's JA Guitar Repairs in Edinburgh so will use his services again. It's to make the action on the Avalon lower as it's 3mm on high E right now which is too high for me

earwighoney · September 2022

Tannin said:

Why not get a professional to do it? It will cost you the price of a couple of pints and you'll get a better job and you will make a useful contact.

It depends really.

It can be a pretty easy thing to know if you are doing. If it is a drop in saddle, of standard specs eg 72mm at 16" radius, you can get cheap ones on eBay to try things out first.

jellyroll · September 2022

I’ve done it myself several times and it’s been fine - and I’m generally an impatient bodger. Flat surface, sand paper and something with a straight line edge to act as a guide to lean the saddle against when sliding it back and forth (I use an acetate sheet about 3mm high).

DavidR · September 2022

jellyroll said:

I’ve done it myself several times and it’s been fine - and I’m generally an impatient bodger. Flat surface, sand paper and something with a straight line edge to act as a guide to lean the saddle against when sliding it back and forth (I use an acetate sheet about 3mm high).

Copy that. It's something I've taught myself to do over the years having gradually come to an understanding of the factors involved in the action of an acoustic. Actually, I think I might list it as the easiest of those factors. I measure the amount required to come off the bottom of the saddle and then gradually work down towards that over the course of 2-3 string changes checking each time if I'm happy. All guitars are so different. I'm sometimes happy before I thought I would be. Buying a new saddle off the interweb is easy enough, although I've never actually cocked it up, but I take my time. A luthier would be quicker than my 'dripping tap' system!

String height gauge and sanding block essential, although I use to just use the table.

Quite a satisfying little job actually. :-)

Mellish · September 2022

Late to this.

All I would add is, if you plan to do it yourself, and it would be your first attempt, get a spare and practice on that, not the original which you would keep as a guide.

ElectricXII · September 2022

I did the saddle on my J-35. I used an old glass shelf with some sandpaper and a straight edge (to run the saddle along) fixed to the glass shelf. It worked a treat.

KrisGee · September 2022

Probably one of the easier setup jobs to do on an acoustic. I'd feel like I wasted money paying for it but that's just me and better safe than sorry if someone doesn't feel confident enough to do it.

Tannin · September 2022

@earwighoney @jellyroll @Mellish @DavidR - I have watched the local luthier do it often enough that I'm happy I could do it myself and get it right first time. But I can't file the nut myself (neither the skills nor the tools) and I can't pick up (let alone fix) unexpected little issues with the ease of an old pro. Happy for him to do it.

It is one of the many little pleasures of buying a new guitar - taking it in to Paul to fettle, chewing the fat a little while he works, seeing how his latest new build is coming along, taking mine home again playing exactly the way I want it to. (Speaking of next new builds, when he finishes the current one, a sub-parlour, my jumbo baritone is next! Yay!

(

thomasross20 · September 2022

Btw the Avalon saddle is comprised of two saddles, not just the one.

thomasross20 · September 2022

Do you get the nut filed, as well...?
Tbh might ask him to do that as would love entire action to come down ever so slightly.

earwighoney · September 2022

thomasross20 said:

Btw the Avalon saddle is comprised of two saddles, not just the one.

In that case, there's no way I'd adjust that myself!

The split saddle seems like a great piece of design.

thomasross20 said:

Do you get the nut filed, as well...?
Tbh might ask him to do that as would love entire action to come down ever so slightly.

AFAIK he shouldn't file the entire nut, but could lower the slots to bring the action down a little.

Tannin said:

But I can't file the nut myself (neither the skills nor the tools) and I can't pick up (let alone fix) unexpected little issues with the ease of an old pro. Happy for him to do it.

I have my own files to enlarge the slots for at the nut, which I have done for most of my electric guitars and a few of my acoustics. It's very easy to have catastrophic results! I once chipped the end of the fretboard trying to replace the nut.

Back to saddles. For some it's a fairly straightforward process, but the split ones like Avalon use would be outside my comfort zone as would the long glued in ones as you can find in some Martin guitars.

Mellish · September 2022

OP ; If you're not confident, leave it to a pro.

If you attempt it, and it goes wrong, the cost to you could be greater

BigPaulie · September 2022

People are all different. One person may be the type who is happy to research and develop a new skill. They have the inclination and time to devote to making this happen.

Some people may be short on cash to pay a professional or live in a remotre location where they don't have access to professional services.

Some people may have plenty money and no time to devote to fettling, and so are happy to pay a professional as it represents good value to them.

Some people may be so ham-fisted that the thought of doing more to a guitar than changing strings fills them with trepidation of the disastrous consequences that await.

They're all right. The key is knowing what type of person you are and being realistic about your knowledge, abilities and limitations.

BillDL · September 2022

In this particular case, as would also be the case with the Takamine guitars that have the two-piece staggered saddles, it would be best leaving it to a guitar tech for two reasons:
(a) If you make an arse of it the saddles most likely aren't off-the-shelf ones so you would have to have them made from scratch or modified from Takamine or other similar ones.
(b) It is much easier to make an arse of two separate saddles than just one.

Reducing the saddle height on an acoustic isn't a difficult job at all. The "difficult" aspect is knowing how much you can safely remove from the saddle's base and still have:
(a) An acceptable action
(b) An acceptable breakover angle from where the strings emerge from the bridge at the pins to the apex of the saddle.

There are ways you can work this out if you have experience. One thing to bear in mind is that when strung up to tension the bridge on a steel string acoustic usually pulls forward creating a dip in the soundboard in front of the bridge and a slight belly in the soundboard behind it. Depending on the type of internal top bracing, the type of wood used for the soundboard, and the age of the guitar, the dip and belly could be almost imperceptible to quite noticeable. If you were to try and measure how much material to file off the bridge while the guitar is unstrung, the results could be off when the guitar is then strung up.

When assessing this a luthier or tech will often use a straightedge lying right on the frets and extending to the bridge. Depending on where the bottom edge of the straightedge line up with the top of the bridge (i.e. over, in line with, or below) it is possible to get a pretty good idea how much, if any, the saddle can be reduced in height.

Another way to make this assessment is by ensuring that the neck relief is set correctly and that the depth of the nut slots are exactly of very close to the depth they need to be, and then measuring the action of the strings at the 12th fret. There are some generally accepted action measurements for the average player and the average acoustic guitar. If the action is much higher than the optimal measurements, the amount that it is higher than you are aiming to achieve can be doubled to give a good approximation of how much needs to come off the saddle. This isn't a rule though, just a guideline, and you can still make an arse of the saddle if you don't have the experience.

If the saddle needs to be lowered by a fair amount you can redress the lost breakover angle of the string over the saddle by filing angled slots into the front of the holes for the bridge pins so that there is a valley in the wood of the bridge for the string to start its angle from deeper into the hole and approach the saddle at a better angle than if it was starting its climb from the top surface of the bridge. This is best left for a very experienced tinkerer or an guitar tech/luthier. You can't replace what you filed off the wood a bit too aggressively.

As far as sanding the base of a one-piece saddle is concerned, others above have mentioned sliding the saddle along a straight and vertical edge to avoid sanding an angle across the thickness of the saddle. That is probably the most common mistake made. The other common issue is where you end sanding more off each end of the saddle resulting in something like the curved rocker of a rocking chair. This happens if you do short back and forward sanding motions while holding the saddle in the middle. I have found the best way to get a flat base is with long sanding motions in one direction and then flip the saddle around and repeat. By holding something like a 6" metal rule or an engineer's square along the base of the saddle and holding it up to the light you can see if you are starting to sand it into a concave or convex curve.

You can usually remove the saddle of an acoustic guitar by slackening the strings quite a lot and lifting them down at the bridge. You can place a capo down near the nut to reduce the amount that the strings will unwind off the tuner posts as you loosen them, and to raise them all at once close to the bridge I use a piece of rubber long enough to span the width of the guitar and tall enough to raise the strings enough to lift the saddles out.

If you were closer to where I live and I wasn't working 6 nights a week at the moment I would have offered to do it for you.

DavidR · September 2022

To fettle nut slots you definitely need specialist nut files and they're expensive so, on a one-off basis, you're likely to be better off going to a luthier. But it's not difficult, just a bit more difficult than filing down bridge saddles. Again, you can do it in stages.

And @BigPaulie makes a good point. It all depends on how handy you are. My Dad was a Carpenter, so I've always been used to using different tools and 'having a go'. But if you do your own decorating, you could probably have a go at doing the jobs under discussion. They're a similar skill level imho.

thomasross20 · September 2022

Wow some great info here, thank you!
I never considered the break angle of the saddle..... !

BillDL · September 2022

Four very good articles in sequence from the blog of a Dublin based luthier Gerry Hayes:

https://hazeguitars.com/blog/acoustic-guitar-tone-and-string-break-angle

https://hazeguitars.com/blog/acoustic-guitar-action-geometry-class

https://hazeguitars.com/blog/acoustic-action-lower-saddle

https://hazeguitars.com/blog/acoustic-guitar-action-final-tips-and-considerations

(this last one talks about the saddle break angle again and also shows how to lower split saddles properly)

thomasross20 · September 2022

Wow great articles - very much appreciated!!

bertie · September 2022

under saddle p/ups can be the cause of great pain, if the saddle is not filed/sanded perfectly flat

thomasross20 · October 2022

Well guys, I got the Avalon back this morning and wow wow wow!!
The saddle has been lowered and it plays a dream, like absolute butter... That was my one previous quibble with it. But £20 to shave the saddle down has transformed this completely.....

bertie · October 2022

thomasross20 said:

like absolute butter..

Image: https://media.tenor.com/dAjBzKj9H3AAAAAC/danger-alert.gif

BillDL · October 2022

Despite you highly objectionable use of an offensive cliché ...... I can't even bring myself to repeat it ..... I am glad the setup has worked out well, and for such a minimal outlay.

thomasross20 · October 2022

Haha I've not been around for a time, do we get the police lights for common phrases lol?

Very happy with it 8)

thomasross20 · October 2022

After some further playing it's still a lot easier to play but, and I might be imagining it.. the volume might be a bit less than before. I think since the saddle was lowered, the break angle of the strings is less so it's transmitting less downward force onto the body. Some notes definitely rattle a bit more with my usual heavy playing but truss rod had been adjusted already. Action at 12th fret is 2mm and I've been reading that fingerstyle players take it even lower and use a bit of buzz to their advantage. Hard to have your cake and eat it with acoustics, isn't it!

rze99 · October 2022

I did my own in Lockdown One. It worked well but I did have loads of time and patience when I did it. Generally best to go to a pro

Mellish · October 2022

@thomasross20 ; sorry, did you say you did the work yourself?

2mm at the 12th? I wouldn't want to go any lower. Mine is 2.48, and that gives me plenty of volume

ElectricXII · October 2022

Mellish said:

@thomasross20 ; sorry, did you say you did the work yourself?

2mm at the 12th? I wouldn't want to go any lower. Mine is 2.48, and that gives me plenty of golume

I agree, 2mm seems very low for an acoustic if we're talking about the low E.

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