New Bridge for 5420

Compton is great.

That being said, I am probably going to go with the tone pros role and pin the bridge.

 

Hi Andrew, welcome to GT. As you note there is tremendous love for the Compton and for good reason. I have a couple of Wayne's brass creations on my gold hardware Gretsch's and they look great. More importantly they sound great. If your intonation is way out you may have to unpin and move the bridge a tiny bit but seriously, don't worry about it. It really is no big deal to have the bridge floating.

 

I tried a Compton bridge on my G5422, and while it improved tone, the intonation wasn't accurate enough for my liking. Like you, I didn't want to float the secured bridge.

Following advice from the fine people here, I ended up fitting a Gotoh Nashville Tune-O-Matic (with small posts). Sounds great, no rattles, and works fine with moderate Bigsby use. The wooden bridge base and posts flex sufficiently that there's really little need for a roller bridge, unless you work the Bigsby hard.

 

It's no big deal with a pinned bridge, where the base rests on two tiny pins in the guitar top. Remove the pins and you're good (with a bit of violin rosin or tape to hold the bridge in place)

Annoyingly, the Electromatic 'secured bridge' uses long threaded posts that screw right through the bridge base, deep into the guitar top. The bridge rigidity relies entirely on those threaded posts, not the wooden base. Look closely at most Electromatics, and you'll see the bridge base isn't actually touching the guitar top. To float an Electromatic bridge, you first need to fit replacement threaded posts, or cut the existing posts. Then, you will most likely need to sand the base to match the contour of the top - not a job everyone would want to tackle.

 

yeah Andrew but the Compton intonation will be excellent provided you give him accuate measurements. That's why they're hand made - cause they fit great.

Another great bridge option is the Tru-Arc.
But the biggest advantage of both Compton & Tru-Arc is the improvement in tone quality they deliver imo.

 

I strongly recommend a non-rocking, radiused, TruArc bar bridge:

 

Interesting, none of mine are like that and I have several Electromatics, including two 5420s. On mine, the bridges are held in place by two little pins that fit into corresponding dimples in the bridge base.

Must have been some changes.

 

A bar bridge with a straight line from E-E, however that line is angled, will rarely offer excellent intonation. The G string will usually be sharp. It's even more noticeable on a shorter scale 24.6" instrument like the 5420. Something like the Tru-Arc Serpentune bridge gets closer to good intonation, but I don't know if Wayne offers anything like that.

Bar bridges of any sort are a compromise on intonation. It depends how much perfect intonation matters to you and your style of playing.

 

Late 2013 apparently.

 

@adauria, some helpful info in this thread.

 

That's exactly what I was thinking too ......and stay away from those TOM bridges ( tuning / Bigsby issues ) round strings over a blade just doesn't work

 

Based on your requirements, the TonePros roller looks like your best bet in gold: curious to know your experience if you go that way. The ABM at 200 is a little crazy, that's not worth it just for the finish--but that definitely would work well. The risk here is the TP will rattle as bad as the others.

Second place, not listed, is the Serpentrune Tru-Arc, but you are also taking a risk that the secured bridge posts are exactly in the right place for your strings. It's also up there price-wise with the ABM.

How much you use the Bigsby is important too. If you just shimmer chords, then a typical TOM can work (check out Setzer, he's no slouch on the Bigs). You might need some play in the TOM posts though, the string will just lock onto the saddle, the whole bridge moves when you hit the arm.

Good luck--in the meantime while you decide, drop some lacquer or clear nail polish on your TOM screws, even around the contact of saddle to bridge--this will stop many rattles pretty well.

 

I highly recommend the tru arc Serpentune in brass.
I have the same guitar you do, in white with gold hardware. The brass is pretty close in color.
The sound improvement was quite noticeable too.
And the intonation is spot on.

Well worth the price, easy to order, and easy to install.

 

Hi adauria,

I had to pin the bridge on my G5420TLH that was not (early G5420 models) because it moved - see the 2 small brass nails counterdrilled on the wood base extrems :





And did the same on my G6119LH too for the same reason :



I replaced the TOM-like bridges for Gretsch (new and genuire) Rocking Bar Bridges (as shown on pics above) because I wanted That Great Gretsch Look and wanted to use the Bigsby deeply, and also replaced the nut with TUSQ XL no-friction model (a PQL-6060-L0 fit to shape) for a correct tuning stability.



But then I experienced buzzing on the center strings or too high action on the extreme strings... I checked the radius of the RBB at 16" and the fret boards at 12" (G5420TLH) and 10" (G6119LH), so I re-radiused these RBB with the help of a metalworker vise, screws and shims to eliminate that radius problem - not rare on RBB it seems, therefore making the Comptons and Tru-Arc bridges so desirable :





Once the convenient position found and pinned, I don't experiment intonation issues with 10-52 Ernie Ball or Dean Markley set of strings.

A+!

 

Andrew, I can't recall ever knowing a Compton bridge offered for sale on this forum to last long. They absolutely can be re-sold. You won't get the full price you paid, but then, you wouldn't expect to. The difference, in my Compton-loving opinion, if that the risk is worth the potential benefit.

 

yeah again I've never heard of either a Compton or Tru-Arc rattling or causing any problems.
Has anyone else?
There's nothing on them that can rattle.
And if you don't like it you can easy sell one here for a 5420

I've got one of each and my Tru-Arc has slightly better intonation than the Compton but really....... I've found the accuracy on both to be so close to perfect it doesn't matter unless you're a total perfectionist.

And the other bridge options probably wouldn't achieve any better intonation anyway

 

I love Tru-Arcs and Comptons, but the only 'problems' they cause are less than ideal intonation (I understand its a choice, no need to go down that well-beaten path) and (for me) increased behind the bridge 'wolf tones'. Put some dampers on the strings, get a wound G string and it's on, however.