June 15, 2010

After the neck set, I located the bridge position, masked off the surface and applied lacquer stripper to remove the lacquer in preparation for the bridge mounting.

100615bridgestrip

This is still a process that I’m not fully comfortable with.  As careful as one can be with the stripping of the lacquer, there is still a wee bit of contamination of the lacquer outside the area to be stripped.  This can be seen at the edge of the bridge after mounting.  It is so very slight, but still evident.  Other approaches would be to mask the box where the bridge will go prior to spraying.  Same goes for the neck/fretboard where it meets the upper bout.

Once the lacquer was removed and the surface roughed up, the bridge was glued and clamped in place.

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After it cures, bridge pin holes will be drilled and tapered in preparation for setup.