|
I just swapped the saddles for a set of three steel Tele barrels since the six saddles are goofy to string up (and I had a set sitting around). No tonal difference really since it already had a crapload of downforce and rang like a bell, it's just is easier to string and has a straight path to the saddle (less likely to break strings). I have them set so high there's practically a 45 degree angle between the saddle and the baseplate!
I have found this to be the perfect recipe for electric slide guitars (for my tastes, which is a zero-fretboard-contact style):
1. .012's or .013's, whatever the guitar can handle without breaking something
2. set the saddles just about as high as they can go with the intonation in a straight line
3. set the pickups (preferably wax potted; I go between clean and flat out) within 3/16" of touching the strings (goofy old pickups like these bring brownie points!)
4. get good tuners (or clean up/oil the stock ones if they are open) to handle the insane amount of tension
It's good to have a system like this since I have a feeling my slide guitars aren't long for this world with a high tuned set of .013's on them, which is usually why I select cheap guitars with twisted/warped necks since they're going to turn out that way anyway.
My other electric slide guitars are weird as well. I have a 70's Global (probably made by Teisco or something) strat copy with a Tele style three brass saddle bridge (it came that way!) and three rather hot (6.8k roughly) ceramic pickups, all with steel baseplates and a three way switch.
I also have an early 60's Eko Mascot hollowbody with a single neck pickup (their proprietary design and rather low output, but it can still get mean with help from a compressor). This one's great because it sounds great unplugged, too, and is quite loud acoustically.
I also have a goofy 12-string abomination I made out of a strat body and a les paul neck wired with a pair of strat pickups in series straight to the jack; that's a fun one!
|