05-02-2016, 09:36 AM
Hit the Martin again - action rose over the winter and into the spring (with an almost straight neck - maybe the thickness of a sheet of paper relief) to .110 on the Low e, 12th fret. Humidity never really got bad until last week.
Had a lot of trouble supergluing the shim with a pre-primed piece of ebony (with thin superglue). I didn't want to go out and get some gel and accelerator, but if there's a part III, well might be in the cards.
Some helpful hints - even with something you pre-primed, its still good to dip the shim in naptha or acetone as well as the saddle.
End of story after 6 or so times putting strings back on, checking etc.
High E - .071 of an inch. About .006 higher than before. (1.8mm)
Low E - .098 of an inch. (2.49mm)
There's almost perfect height over the saddle (.120 to .140 Inches), so no need for neck reset. (3.0 to 3.5mm)
The old formula of 2x the time you want to drop off the bottom of the saddle does not seem to work here - naked saddle was .078" on the low E. That shim was about .022" to start with, so it should have wound up at .089" (I think that would have been perfect). I also sanded it a lot, but just lightly on each adjustment.
AC's on now, and hanging around 50% humidity, which is about perfect. Going to run through this set of strings and see what i have at the end of the summer. Its been cased all winter - humidity might get low a few hours of the day, but overall should have been fine seeing it was cased.
Shim goes all the way across now. That's good. Thing is I suspect a brace might have popped loose. I had some reglued with the refret I had done 5 years ago. Its got to go back for service to fix some loose binding, but I'm going to wait until fall - might take it back to the guy who refretted it instead of my local guy, who seems to be more of a specialist in acoustics.
Lesson learned - heat is your friend to get superglue to cure. Not too much, maybe from a light bulb.
On the subject of shimming a saddle, I've even read some repair guys intentionally shim saddles to give wood to wood contact. Seeing it out, I like the look of it.
Had a lot of trouble supergluing the shim with a pre-primed piece of ebony (with thin superglue). I didn't want to go out and get some gel and accelerator, but if there's a part III, well might be in the cards.
Some helpful hints - even with something you pre-primed, its still good to dip the shim in naptha or acetone as well as the saddle.
End of story after 6 or so times putting strings back on, checking etc.
High E - .071 of an inch. About .006 higher than before. (1.8mm)
Low E - .098 of an inch. (2.49mm)
There's almost perfect height over the saddle (.120 to .140 Inches), so no need for neck reset. (3.0 to 3.5mm)
The old formula of 2x the time you want to drop off the bottom of the saddle does not seem to work here - naked saddle was .078" on the low E. That shim was about .022" to start with, so it should have wound up at .089" (I think that would have been perfect). I also sanded it a lot, but just lightly on each adjustment.
AC's on now, and hanging around 50% humidity, which is about perfect. Going to run through this set of strings and see what i have at the end of the summer. Its been cased all winter - humidity might get low a few hours of the day, but overall should have been fine seeing it was cased.
Shim goes all the way across now. That's good. Thing is I suspect a brace might have popped loose. I had some reglued with the refret I had done 5 years ago. Its got to go back for service to fix some loose binding, but I'm going to wait until fall - might take it back to the guy who refretted it instead of my local guy, who seems to be more of a specialist in acoustics.
Lesson learned - heat is your friend to get superglue to cure. Not too much, maybe from a light bulb.
On the subject of shimming a saddle, I've even read some repair guys intentionally shim saddles to give wood to wood contact. Seeing it out, I like the look of it.
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