Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

stsang wrote:I agree it's a very practical and useful thing to have, but in my humble, personal opinion, it will marr the sleek and shiny look of my Rics to have those little black set screws on the side of the bridge plate...

You would barely be able to see them, bit of a weak reason to ignore something that improves the functionality of the guitar.

Coolness and functionality to one person is a departure from the comfortable and familiar to another.

The great news is that there are options out there for all to enjoy as they wish.

I always marvel at the ingenious designs that people come up with but sometimes, for purely aesthetic reasons, choose to keep some things conventional.

Grey wrote:You would barely be able to see them, bit of a weak reason to ignore something that improves the functionality of the guitar.

I would see it! (and I would see it on someone's Ric too)

admin wrote:Coolness and functionality to one person is a departure from the comfortable and familiar to another.

Bravo!

Well that goes without saying, form over function could essentialy be the Rickenbacker motto.

I'll likely pick one up for one of my Ricks; I am a fairly aggressive Accent VB user, and my factory bridges sometimes suffer. I tried two TOM bridge conversions; a roller, and a standard. Neither was satisfactory wrt strings periodically popping out of their saddles, despite a number of adjustments. I've gone back to the factory bridge, but would like to try one of these. I use my Ricks for lead work.

It appears to be a great design. I will buy at least two if the reports are positive.

I love the Mastery Bridge on my Jazzmaster. Like a few of you I'd love to see if the "locking" base plate is offered seperately, as my main issue is the shift in the height adjustment screws when using the Accent vibrato, rather than the travel over the roller bridge. Still, I'm interested in hearing if it adds sustain and resonance to Ricks in the same way as it does to a JM.

It looks like the ETA on this bridge is sometime in the next month or so.

AFAIK, the Rickenbacker baseplate and bridge design has been around since the late 1950s. Have there really been no alternative designs available in the past 50+ years?

Good question, Simon... I do know lots of drilling was done to install anything from tune-o-matics to whatever people wanted on it, but something that could actually be fitted and is fully reversible???

From John at Mastery:

Our base plate is actually slightly wider than the current Ric bridge so there will be more travel room… However, the body-plate will be the same. Our body-plates will be unique to our bridges and will not be sold separately. I'm hoping to offer a cover as well, which will be sold separately. We're in the process of tooling a form for them now. Like our other bridges, all parts will be non-corrosive stainless, with the saddles being made of brass and plated with our unique hard-chrome plating. Much of the resonance you hear in your Jag is from our patented saddle design which should translate well with the Rics. I'm reviewing more prototypes next week and we hope to have the bridge available for sale in October.

Wildberry wrote:Good question, Simon... I do know lots of drilling was done to install anything from tune-o-matics to whatever people wanted on it, but something that could actually be fitted and is fully reversible???

The TOM bridge mod as Jeff and Collin make them are fully reversible as well. My guitar setup had issues with the string spacing and tendency to pop out of the saddle, even after adjustments and employ of a nifty mini file set on the saddle slots....

I am looking forward to trying one of these out.

I have one of their bridges for the Jazzmaster and it is definitely an improvement. The standard Rickenbacker bridges can be finicky and on one of my guitars one of the height adjustment screws is in a constant state of unscrewing itself from vibration no matter how I try to make sure everything is happily seated. Re-tightening it now and then by hand so it doesn't fall out has become an automatic part of playing the guitar, and I don't even mind. No doubt Rckenbacker would have liked to re-engineer these designs but are aware that the customers don't necessarily want the "new and improved" look and feel, and I guess I'm one of those customers. The Mastery bridges are a good option for the kind of upgrade that doesn't look too different from the original, and they address issues that concern some players. On the Jazzmaster, the original bridge is so rattley you know something bad is happening! Only some Rickenbacker roller bridges have made me wonder about a significant loss of energy. And actually those guitars seemed fine when plugged in.

Nice. Pretty sure Nels Cline uses these on all of his Jazzmasters.

I'd be worried about limited adjustment, however, compared to the RIC bridge.