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- Country of Manufacture: USA
This bridge is a direct replacement for Gibson guitars with an ABR-1 or Nashville bridge (the Nashville bridge uses Callaham's special conversion posts). The body of this bridge is CNC machined from a billet of cold-rolled medium-carbon steel, subject to rigid quality-control standards at every level of production. This is the only alloy steel bridge available - Gibson bridges, as well as other aftermarket bridges, are cast from zinc alloy, brass, or aluminum, which causes heavy dampening of the critical overtones that support the fundamental.
TONAL CONSIDERATIONS
Tone, or timbre, is all about overtones that are combined with the fundamental. The choice of bridge material is critical for the simple reason that every note played is influenced by the bridge. The ABR-1 bridge introduced in 1954 was cast from zinc because it was cheap to produce and evidently, nobody at Gibson thought that it made any difference.
Aftermarket bridges have copied the use of zinc without any thought given to how this could be improved. In the '70s, several years after they had purchased Fender, CBS threw out Leo's steel Strat bridge and changed to the one-piece cast zinc (zamak) bridge to cut costs. The result was arguably the worst sounding Strats produced by Fender. Zinc is simply not the right material to use for bridges. Brass has been used because it has "more mass", titanium and aluminum because they have "less mass", but mass is not the property of the bridge material that matters. However, it is easy to measure for those who do not understand vibrations.
No material transmits the energy delivered from the string while maintaining a full musical frequency response better than steel. Callaham's ABR-1 is perhaps the most significant improvement you can make to a Gibson-styled instrument.
CONSTRUCTION & SPECIFICATIONS
The body is gold plated to mil-spec standards in order to maintain all critical dimensions. The intonation screws, mounting studs, and thumb wheels are all gold-plated as well. The quality control observed during production and plating allows the intonation screws to be a press fit into the bridge body. The saddles are machined from the same brass bar stock that Callaham uses in their Tele saddles, and are gold plated. They are direct replacements for both Callaham ABR-1 and Gibson ABR-1 bridges.
What you will hear with the change to steel is a low end that is tight but full, with proper balance between the wound and the plain strings. The plain strings will be full without the harsh high-end spike. Sustain is improved substantially, facilitating vibrato. If you've ever fallen victim to a stock bridge collapsing from string pressure, then this will be a thing of the past - you will not collapse Callaham's steel bridge. The rigidity of the steel will allow the use of heavy string gauges, while transmitting the strings' energy far better than zinc, aluminum, or brass.
The bridge body has set screws to lock it to the posts, for optimal energy transfer. This also prevents the bridge from falling off of the guitar duing string changes.
The saddles on these bridges are un-notched, and should be notched by a pro. Most guitars do not have optimal string spacing and pole alignment when the notch is in the center of the saddle. Therefore it is best to notch the saddles for each individual guitar.
NASHVILLE
In the mid-1980s Gibson started equipping the majority of their models with the Nashville bridge. This bridge was marketed as an improvement, but was in fact a step backward. The honeycombed zinc casting is weak and the extra width of the bridge causes problems with obtaining the correct string angle back to the tailpiece. Callaham's Nashville conversion kit allows the seamless replacement of a Nashville bridge with their ABR-1 bridge. With this change you not only gain the undeniable tonal improvements of their ABR-1, but also the vintage look, and without any modification to the instrument.
The Nashville studs can be used to replace many other bridges besides those from Gibson. The stud is designed to fit a .278" diameter hole that is at least 1/2" deep. When installing Nashville studs, the 6-32 threaded section must be protected. Pressing or tapping directly on that section can bend it. Callaham includes a tube that should be used to drive the stud into place.
COSMETICS
Regarding looks, today's ABR-1 bridges have none of the hand-working and tapering of the ends of the bridges, as compared to those from the mid/late '50s. Callaham specifically machines the ends of their ABR-1 to a taper, and through the course of hand-polishing recreates the look of the late '50s bridge bodies. The stainless steel thumb wheels are thinner as compared to today's production, like the '50s models.
Gibson Guitars are not cheap. $2,000 gets you the budget models, and the price of Historics puts them out of reach for the average hardworking professional or amateur musician. Yet all these guitars have a bridge that costs perhaps $8.00 to produce. Per Callaham:
"The Historics especially try to dazzle you with looks and marketing. We had over 20 Historics in when we were doing the prototypes, all of which sound night and day better when we changed the bridges. It had been several years since I played a real "burst", when we brought in two and changed the bridges it left us speechless. Looks and price does not influence me, only sound. But if you really want to improve the sound of your Gibson I strongly suggest our bridge. You must get past looks and price and listen to the overtones around the fundamental. For those with a Nashville bridge, be ready for a tremendous improvement. If you own a real PAF equipped instrument, you need to hear what it really can produce."