Members jacobarber Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 I bought my girlfriend an Xaviere XV-620, which is the semi-hollow Telecaster clone. It's her 1st electric guitar, and she likes it quite a bit. Before giving it to her, I spent a few hours setting things up so it plays as nicely as my guitars. Well, I couldn't accomplish that the way I wanted. After new strings, adjusting the truss rod, pickup heights, and action, I tried to intonate. With the 3-saddle bridge, intonation just doesn't exist. This is the 1st Tele I've ever dealt with, so I figured that it probably wouldn't give me any issues. After this experience, I cannot figure out why the {censored} anyone is making 3-saddle bridges anymore. It's like making a car with a clutch that purposely slips, or a TV with intentionally messed up colors. I understand there is a "Telecaster sound" that so many people want to have, and that apparently the [brass] 3-saddle bridge is part of that equation. But is it seriously worth compromising a properly tuned instrument for 15% more twang? Even with compensated saddles, a Tele can't achieve intonation equal to a 6-saddle guitar. So what is the deal with guitar makers still using 3-saddle bridges? Would it be possible to achieve the Telecaster sound by using a brass 6-saddle bridge and brass nut instead? What is the point in using horribly designed parts on both inexpensive and expensive guitars? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vintage55 Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 I agree...I would much rather give up a little bit of twang, or sound in general, to have a tele than I can intonate. All my teles are 6 saddle, as a result. A compensated might help some, but being able to totally adjust each saddle individually is more important to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 's mel gibson Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 Those barrels twist a bit and that's how you get what you need. I agree it's not the best system in the world but it has worked. And still works for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Charley_5054 Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 My CV Tele has a three saddle bridge, and I didn't have any trouble getting a great intonation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blueballoon Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 Tele's sound better with 3 brass barrels, I don't think there's a substitute. Look at all the pro 3 saddle players out there...past and present. It works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members drunkinminer Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 I know I'm going to get blasted for this but compensated saddles are just a money making sceame. Think about it what did Page, Beck, Perkins, to name a few do when compensated saddles weren't invented yet. They made due. I use the Jerry Donahue method and have no need for compensated since doing this. http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/choosing-installing/tech-tips/saddle_up_your/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bobbo Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 This set swivels in the middle for better intonation. They are expensive though. $43.00 for the saddles only.http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Nuts,_saddles/Electric_guitar_saddles/Wilkinson_Adjustable_Compensated_Bridge_for_Tele.html?tab=Pictures#details Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sxyryan Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 I use a tele with a non compensated 3 saddle bridge. 5 out of 6 are spot on intonation wise, my G gets a little sharp as I go up, but not much. I prefer them myself. They look better, in my opinion, as well. Use your ears a little and you'll never play out of tune. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MattKirkcaldie Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 For some weird reason my 3-saddle Tele sounds fine, even though it doesn't intonate with 100% accuracy. With each saddle half way between the intonation points of the two strings the errors are very small anyway. I would recommend using strings with a wound G in order to sweeten it up a bit - plain Gs often sound sour to me, even correctly intonated on 6-saddle guitars. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jacobarber Posted December 22, 2009 Author Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 For some weird reason my 3-saddle Tele sounds fine, even though it doesn't intonate with 100% accuracy. With each saddle half way between the intonation points of the two strings the errors are very small anyway. I would recommend using strings with a wound G in order to sweeten it up a bit - plain Gs often sound sour to me, even correctly intonated on 6-saddle guitars. I use a wound 3rd on all my electrics, but I put regular 10s on this guitar because I don't want my GF to get fatigued super quick. The G is definitely the worst of them, though. Maybe its just me. I know I have very good relative pitch, and I can often hear when professional guitarists have out of tune strings. Drives me a little nuts sometimes. I'm going to abandon this 3-saddle bull{censored} and install a 6-saddle bridge ASAP. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members savoldi Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Nuts,_saddles/Electric_guitar_saddles/Compensated_Bridge_Saddles_for_Tele.html These are only 15 bucks. I got a set for my Xaviere. I only had to change the saddle for the E and A strings. Everything else I got pretty close by tweaking the string height a bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members PanaDP Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 It takes some work, but you can file the saddles on top so they intonate properly with a wound G. With an unwound G, the spread is too great on the middle saddle to work this way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Angry Tele Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 mine intonate just fine. I use both Glendale and stock 52RI. Compensated is not a scam lol thats pretty funny. Glendales not only intonate better, they have thier own unique sound due to the way the saddles couple againts each other. If youd ever tried them youd hear it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cats-o-caster Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 Those barrels twist a bit and that's how you get what you need. I agree it's not the best system in the world but it has worked. And still works for me. Agree. Never had a major problem Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ashasha Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 I know all about the purists, but I'd love to see a blind sound test done on this one. I am sure that there is some difference, but I doubt that it would make one sound like crap and one sound holy. I prefer to just do it the easy and lazy way with the 6 brass saddles. Quick and accurate and stays in tune all the time. The 3 brass saddles do look cool, but other than that I'll pass. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BoneNut Posted December 22, 2009 Members Share Posted December 22, 2009 This set swivels in the middle for better intonation. They are expensive though. $43.00 for the saddles only.http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Nuts,_saddles/Electric_guitar_saddles/Wilkinson_Adjustable_Compensated_Bridge_for_Tele.html?tab=Pictures#details Although my Telecaster came from the factory with compensated saddles, I couldn't get the intonation right. I purchased those adjustable ones from Stewmac (just the saddles) and problem solved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bugly Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 thing is no matter what you do on any guitar the intonation is off at some fret and string - as other threads have mentioned the tempered guitar has inherit problems with intonation as do most string instruments. Intonation at the twelth fret is not a solution its a compromise - as is any tuning methodology. The 3 brass barrels with all their issues help make a Tele sound like a Tele to me. I have tried modern bridges with individual saddles - to me it no longer sounded like a tele - the old bridge went back on. YMMV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Tupelo Son Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 I'm an intonation snob only because I play mostly chords. Seems most lead players, or players that play mostly "notes" have no problem with 3 saddle bridges. On the other hand, chord players tend to hate a 3 saddle bridge.... A slightly out of tune chord is "uglier" than a slightly out of tune note. my 2 cents.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members golias Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 thing is no matter what you do on any guitar the intonation is off at some fret and string - as other threads have mentioned the tempered guitar has inherit problems with intonation as do most string instruments.Intonation at the twelth fret is not a solution its a compromise - as is any tuning methodology. The 3 brass barrels with all their issues help make a Tele sound like a Tele to me. I have tried modern bridges with individual saddles - to me it no longer sounded like a tele - the old bridge went back on. YMMV This. Personally, I think the 3x2 bridge is yet another ugly-looking element of an ugly-looking guitar, but I love how my Tele sounds and I have no intention of changing anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Oldskool Texas Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 With the 3-saddle bridge, intonation just doesn't exist ... I cannot figure out why the {censored} anyone is making 3-saddle bridges anymore. I somehow doubt that all of the millions of 3-barrel Telecasters out there are improperly intonated. No offense to anyone, but should all Teles be judged by the shortcomings of an inexpensive copy? I replaced my 6-saddle bridge with a Wilkinson compensated 3-barrel from Guitar Fetish. Looks great, sounds great, intonates great. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Dr. P Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 I have two teles with 3-barrel saddles. Never had a problem with intonation. You just have to compromise, since you are doing two strings at once. But here's a revelation maybe for some of you: intonation is in any case a compromise, even on the most finely tuned saddles. It's called temperament, and it is one of the reasons some people turn to Indian classical music. The advantages of having that tonality on a telecaster with the 3 saddles far far outweighs the slight disadvantage that your 13th fret barre chord might not be perfectly in tune. I invite you to you to the Telecaster Forum - tdpri - and see how many people believe that the American Standard tele should still have a 3-barrel bridge - the vast majority of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Burningleaves Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 A lot of that "twang" comes from the interaction of the pickup base-plate and the bridge base plate.......http://www.tdpri.com/resources/tele-bridge-base-plate-materials/ I like the 6 inline saddles. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ignatz Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 I haven't had significant trouble with my uncompensated 3-saddle bridge either. Besides the Jerry Donahue scheme, I'd suggest the OP also experiment with the height of the saddles as a way to make fine adjustments: lowering one side of a saddle will shorten the string on that side. Of course, if you don't want to bother with all the futzing, there's nothing wrong with 6-saddle bridges at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bsman Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 There is no magic tone-fairy dust in a three-barrel bridge. It is, quite simply, the cheapest, nastiest thing Leo could come up with that would work (sort of). The tele was designed to be easily fabricated by semi-skilled labor from easily produced parts, including stamped (as opposed to machined) metal parts like bridges, etc. I have owned six teles, with "traditional" as well as modern bridges, and I am totally convinced that Leo's original three-saddle design was a monstrosity. It is terribly fiddly, unstable, and not only almost impossible to intonate properly but also highly prone to problems with string height, etc. I have replaced the "traditional" bridges with modern, six-saddle bridges and have detected virtually NO diminution of tone -- the only noticeable difference is that chords are actually in tune all the way up the neck. I think the almost fanatical devotion to the original bridge design is simply a symptom of the almost hysterical conservatism that permeates the world of guitars, where the apotheosis of guitar design was supposedly reached before 1960, and everything since has been a decline. If the rest of the world behaved this way, we'd still be waiting for the tubes in our computers to warm up whilst replacing the ice blocks in our iceboxes to cool our beer...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 55gibby Posted January 21, 2010 Members Share Posted January 21, 2010 My tele originally had a three saddle bridge, it seemed stable and wasn't any harder to intonate... I ended up putting on a bigsby. Now it has something like a TOM bridge Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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