How to properly install a guitar or bass bridge (QUICK TIPS)
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How to properly place a bridge
People ask me this question all the time, so I figured it’s time to answer it once and for all with a simple demonstration. I’m dan. This is guns and guitars, and this is how to properly position a bridge for your guitar or bass build.
Quick disclaimer. I’m not a pro luthier. I’ve never claimed to be, I’m just a hobbyist that likes to share what I’ve learned with you guys here along the way. So I’m not sure if this is the best way to do it, this is just the way I do it. In this video I’ll be demonstrating how to do this on a jazz bass, but this applies to both bass and guitars.
First you need to know the scale length of your neck. You find this out by measuring the distance from the nut to the 12th fret, then double it. As you can see, the distance here is 17”, so double it, and I have a 34” scale neck.
Next, use a straight edge and line it up with each side of the neck and draw a line as though the neck were continuing down the rest of the body. This will help you center the bridge with your neck.
Then, measure your scale length from the nut, in this case, 34”, and mark between the other two lines you just drew. You should end up with a drawing like this.
Now, the line you drew for the scale length is where you want the saddles of your bridge to be pinching the strings. But because the exact position for proper intonation varies from string to string, I like to set my bridge saddles to about 2/3 of the full length of their adjustment screws. I find that more often than not I end up pulling the saddles back a bit for proper intonation, but Incase they need to be moved forward, we’ll leave a little bit of space there. Okay, now line up your bridge so it’s centered with the two parallel neck lines, and so that he bridge saddles line up with the perpendicular scale length line. Mark where your screw holes are, and drill pilot holes. Then screw down your bridge. That should place the bridge pretty close to where it needs to be for proper intonation. If you find that you’re pulling the screws way back, you can always cut your screws down shorter, or if you need to extend them out further you can always buy longer screws at your local hardware store. Of course both of these things only work to the limit of your bridges overall size, so if you have to extend past that one way or another to get proper intonation, you’ll just have to move your bridge. Don’t worry, it’s not the end of the world. Just use some wood filler in your existing holes, move the bridge back or forward as needed, and screw it down again. More often than not you’ll just end up covering those holes up with your bridge anyway. If not, then you were way off, and you probably didn’t follow this guide to begin with.