Making lap steel bridges

Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

I just finished taking 6 students through building lap steels. It went pretty good, and they all play. I had to economize with cheap Chinese pickups and bridge hardware, but even the lipstick pickups sound pretty decent. On the next go around I would like to step up on the pickups and hardware. I'd like to do a string through the body design with a substantial bridge that we could make ourselves. Any suggestions? Thanks, Bob

David Matzenik · From: Cairns, on the Coral Sea

The bridge could be a length of metal rod set in a routed groove.The groove might have to be in a pad for the string height above the pickup.
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Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

Dave, Thanks for the idea. I actually have a small milling machine that I've never used except for milling wood parts. I visited a local machinist friend yesterday and he showed me some #103 stainless steel that can be polished to look like chrome. I want a bridge with some substantial mass, so I'm going to learn how to mill that. I hope to make a bridge much like what you see on a soprano uke. Just mill a raised saddle section and round over the back to direct the strings down into the body. We'll see how that goes.

James Kerr · From: Scotland, UK

Bob,
Take a look at this design of Bridge, its made of wood with a 3/16 rod to carry the strings, slots in the wood for the strings to pass through and down into the body. Listen to the sound and judge if lack of great mass has any bearing on the output.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KyLWRZVZV8

James.

Rick Barnhart · From: Arizona, USA

That's a really nice looking guitar, Bob. Good on ya for taking students along for the ride.
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Jamie Howze · From: Boise, ID

This page on the Lollar forum shows a simple string through bridge using angle iron.

Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

Thanks for all the replies. Jamie, appreciate the suggestion. I've seen those types of bridges and might end up using something like that. Would really like to find a customer who would bite on me using one of those Lollar Horseshoe Magnetic Pickups. Pricey, but it would be great to try one. I love the old ones! James, I
don't know if mass actually matters when it comes to what you can do with electronics, but I just want to try something heavier. Back in the 1970's I used to build electric guitars in Texas, but for the last 35 years I've been building acoustic guitars & ukes with a couple of lap steels thrown in. My previous lap steels had some concoction of ebony with brass saddles for bridges. This last batch for the students had kind of funky electric tele style bridges, which worked fine. However, I don't like the way those little saddles squirm around and change the string spacing. I would like to try rock solid stainless and see what happens. And then there is the challenge. As an acoustic guitar maker, I'm basically a woodworker. Working with steel seems like it might open up some new possibilities for me. Hope you all enjoy your music.--Bob

Keith Glendinning · From: United Kingdom

In one of my builds I used a Tele bridge and removed the saddles. I replaced the saddles with a piece of 15mm dia Stainless Steel round bar with a flat filed on the bottom. The flat gave it a good ground for the string vibrations and once I had it in the correct position (fret 12 X 2) I ran some CA glue into the edges. The sound improvement over the saddles was very noticeable.
Keith.

George Piburn · From: The Land of Enchantment New Mexico

Our most Hawaiian Sounding Bridges were 3/8 diameter Brass Rod set in wood holders. DynaLap - West Coast - Steels did the same basic thing too.

Now we have the Brass Polished and Nickel plated for looks and non tarnish.

We have tried most all metals and find Brass the more desirable tone and sustain.

It's other advantages , -- 360 brass is very machinable friendly, and plate friendly.

In my case we went ahead and invested in lathe time to cut V Grooves for exacting spacing and to set the string top plane to our desired flatness. Plus we turned the ends to a radius for looks.

I use my drill press to spin the brass and use 800 wet sand paper to clean it to smooth and 0000 steel wool splashed with auto compound to bring it to super shine. Takes about 3 minutes.

Stainless is very hard and makes for extra bright tone , and more important , very picky on milling , -- eats up cutters big time.

Simple 1/2 X 1/2 X 1/8 Angle Brass is the most economical - easiest to lay down and set for scale.
Light file work makes for quick round over and groove action.
Easy to drill down holes for hold down screws.
We use this for both nut and bridges on our more economy instruments, awesome sustain and tone.

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Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

Keith, Thanks for the saddle idea. I think that might be a good idea for the nut. Chuck the stainless rod in the lathe and turn the grooves for the strings like George suggested, and then mill a flat on the bottom and drill a couple of holes to screw it down. I think I'll try that one. George, What an impressive bit of work on your site! I really appreciate your willingness to share ideas with others. I Always give credit where credit is due, and I'll do the same with your info. The more I learn about metal, remember I'm basically an acoustic instrument wood guy, the more fun it seems to work with. If I was 20 instead of 70, I could see a whole new wing of the shop with metal working machinery! While brass is easy to work, here in Hawaii it tarnishes pretty fast and can look funky. Chrome or nickel plated brass also corrodes from the inside out, with the plating eventually flaking off. That said, I think I'll plug ahead on stainless to see how hard it is to deal with and what the tone is like.. Everything, after all, is just a matter of learning new techniques. Stainless angle is really cheap on the web and seems like a place to start.

Tom Pettingill · From: California, USA (deceased)

Good looking build Bob!

Being that you are familiar with a set bridge design for acoustic instruments, you could do the same for an electric. Make a metal string ball retainer to go on the back and use it for your string ground. That opens up tons of different materials you can experiment with for saddles.

I do a similar thing on some of my builds, though I use 1/4" rod for the saddle.

.

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Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

Tom, Wow, nice stuff! Thanks for the bridge idea of a design that will allow me to try different saddle materials with the same bridge. That's a great idea. I'll try to come up with a variation of that. It will save a lot of time on the milling. I don't know enough about steel pickups to know what all you have going on on your instruments, but the variety is incredible. Thank you very much for sharing. A lot to think about. I could not find a website for you, only the FB page. FB is very frustrating to me, but that's just me.-Bob

Jim Pitman · From: Waterbury Ctr. VT 05677 USA

I made one with adjustable intonation. It's quite simple with a pair of set screws/springs that move a 3/8" brass rod closer or farther to/from the nut. I have plans, both a string thru body or bridge anchor version (shown). PM me if interested. I'll send you a PDF. The intonation feature just means you can fine tune which of course is not as important with a lap steel compared to a fretted instrument but nonetheless...

Bob Gleason · From: Hawaii, USA

One thing about steels that is totally different from the guitar and uke world I live in is the incredible depth of design. There certainly is no consensus about what a steel should look like. Lots of cool shapes and metal work. I'm kind of sorry to have run into this new interest so late in life! Jim, I sent you a PM. Great work.
Bob
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Billy Mostyn · From: Queensland, Australia

That's a nice looking lap steel Jim Pitman

Peter Jacobs · From: Northern Virginia

Jim Pitman -- That use like a useful capability to make a small adjustment to dial in the intonation a little better. I think Loni Spector does something similar, but to replace the saddles on a Tele bridge.

How do you like that GFS pickup?
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Joe Elk · From: Ohio, USA

For Tom Pettingill - Tom: I have always used Angle Aluminum. Do you think Angle brass would be better? Second question is about the P/U. Do you like that P/U.

I found (they look the same) from A site Guitar Fetish GFS They list a lot of P/Us If that is the source I would like to order the one used. Thinking of building a Fry Pan look alike (sort of) I would what a GFS would cost 600 would cause the War Department a lot of angry words.

GFS site is http://www.guitarfetish.com/GFS-Gold-Foil-Humbucker-Black-Bridge-66K-Ferrite-Soapbar-_p_14432.html

Joe O Elk Ohio

Tom Pettingill · From: California, USA (deceased)

Joe ... I would not say brass is better, just different ... nothing wrong with aluminum. In any event, give some brass a try and see what you prefer.

That Goldfoil pickup is from Lollar. I've no experience with the GFS line of Goldfoils, so could not directly comment on them. From what I can tell of them though, they are not necessarily vintage correct, but that does not mean they could not sound good either. They are cheap enough that you can't get hurt too bad and being that it fits in a standard P90 route, there are many good upgrade avenues if you should ever decide to try something else.
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