Greg's #3 ES-1F

[HarmonIser]

That bridge looks good quality - where did you buy yours from?
I had similar problems with a 1974 Greco ES style, and ended up filing down the underside of the bridge, which isn't the ideal...

[GregLane]

Hi H
The brand is Goldo from Germany and I believe they have the good reputation for quality. (www.goeldo.de)
The bridge is great. I wanted a tail piece as well but they were out of stock. Using the Pitbull standard still. No problems though.
You cannot go direct to the company. The Australian dealer is The Rock Inn in WA. (therockinn.com)
They were very helpful as they had to import the order as they did not carry the stock.
They knew about PitBull so if you buy something tell them you build stuff with PitBull kits and maybe even mention that I put the bits on the site. If we get enough people mentioning Pit Bull, Adam may be able to do a deal.
Greg

[Simon Barden]

Can you measure the height from the base to toe top of the highest saddle? I need to try and find a lower bridge to make my ES3 playable. I did the bridge base filing thing for my ES-1 (yes the neck angle is really too shallow on that as well) but that's not good enough for the ES3. If it's less than 12mm then that's better than what I've got. 10mm would be nice!

[HarmonIser]

@GregLane
Good to know - I guess it was likely to be metric, i.e. compatible with Chinese made...

@Simon Barden
I recall seeing you had a problem with bridge height, and mentioning you should have angled the neck heel, or pocket to allow more height....
I'm going to angle mine on the GR-1, as I think I'll use a floating wooden bridge (like the original Harmony H62), either with or without adjustable bridge saddles. I like the idea of intonation being spot on, and got the kit made with post holes, but I might just make a wooden base, with small posts to sit into those holes. I have a Schaller roller bridge, with 3 way adjustment, but I want to use a B6, instead of B70 style, (and haven't sussed out yet), but there may not be enough down pressure to justify the roller bridge.

[Simon Barden]

I know I should have angled the heel more, but it looked OK at first glance, and angling a big neck block like that so that everything mates up nice and flat wasn't going to be an easy job at all. So many things to go wrong and I'd probably have needed more tools than I have and a proper workshop (which I don't have). It was just a badly made kit.

The Goldo bridge has the standard Gibson US post hole size with 4mm threads on the bottom to screw into the inserts. It's easy enough to get the converters that have an 8mm lower thread for use with most Asian-made guitars and the Pit Bull kits.

I've bought a bit of ebony so I may well make myself a low floating bridge if this Goldo low-profile bridge is too tall to work properly. I've looked on the Goldo website but they haven't got any dimension drawings. Just saying 9.7mm height is very vague and could just be the main body height. But saying that, as Gregs pic has the 8mm wide posts in view, it does look to be around 10mm in overall height, which is promising. I need to go and do some more measuring on the ES-3 and see if that' good enough. I haven't been able to look at it since last year as I was so disappointed with it.

[GregLane]

Simon - I have done the measurements and agree with Goldo that the height of the bridge is 9.7mm. That is if the bridge is sitting on a flat surface and measuring the height to the highest saddles (middle two). I also got a measurement of 10.7 from the top of the knurled adjuster to the top of the string on the 4th saddle.

You could also save 1 to 2 mm by using bushes without the rim. But I guess you would need to be real careful not the scratch the finish when doing adjustments.

Maybe you could slip across the channel and get half a dpzen for us. hihi

XP - You will notice in the photos that the break angle from the bridge to the tail piece is fairly shallow. From my limited knowledge I would think that that looks close to as shallow as recommended by the experts. I have no string buzz so that angle is fine.
I am extremely happy with the tone and playability of the ES now. Even with the standard kit pups for the moment.

Goldo does have matching tail pieces but they look pretty standard in size and shape. Not "low profile". I did order one but they didn't have any in stock. It was replaced with a Gotoh GE101Z . Holes in the ES kit were very tight (distance apart) The PB stock tailpiiece originally fitted with a bit of effort but he Gotoh was a fraction wider and I chickened out halfway through really having to force screwing it down. So now have the PB tailpiece back in.

[Simon Barden]

Thanks fr that Greg. Worth a try. Probably have to import from Germany as I can't see any UK retailers at the moment.

I'm going to have to inset the inserts as they are rimmed types, sitting on top of the body and so could be lower. Can't really go with non-rimmed types as the ES-3 is a hollow guitar, and there is only a small wood block under the bridge area and the insert hole goes all the way through, so the rim stops the insert being pushed all the way into the body. Will probably have to touch-up the paintwork around them.

If you wanted the strings lower, you could probably do a reverse 'Bonamassa' stringing, turn the tailpiece upside down and run the strings under the bottom of the tailpiece. It wouldn't look pretty, but it would work. A tailpiece with an unstamped base would look best aesthetically, IMO. If you just ran the strings under the base as it was, you've got a couple of sharp angles for the strings to run over, which may lead to breakage issues as they age and fatigue with use.

[GregLane]

Sounds like you agree with me that that string break is at its minimum. But entirely satisfactory as I gave it a workout this afternoon with no problems.
I’ll be interested if you do give the Goldo a go. I’ll watch the forum for progress.

[Simon Barden]

Need to find a gold one!

[Simon Barden]

No gold ones. Aaaaggggghhhh!