Oversized Bone Guitar Saddle. Over 3.9mm or Over 80mm Long or Over 9.5mm high
Designed and Made By Chris Alsop in his workshops in Derbyshire, UK.

This saddle is made from high density Ox bone and is for use on steel strung acoustic guitars.
These saddles are renowned to give excellent tone, playabilty and instrument projection.

We make the parts using precision measurement, precision cutters with careful hand finishing and polishing. An accurate, high quality manufacture results. We communicate closely with the buyer to make sure we get the right specification and you receive the full benefit of our knowledge of guitar saddles.

Your saddle replacement is in good hands.We have the right experience of manufacture and we know what a guitar needs to give the best tone, intonation and acoustic or pickup response.

I base the design on your existing saddle - just send it too us, or precisely measure it - and provide any amendments.

All parts are made, measured and tested by Chris Alsop.

This saddle manufacture is suitable for all guitars from 1/4 size (typically 50mm length saddle with 1 to 2 mm width) to large 12 string guitars with saddles over 80mm long.

A typical action (string to top of fret distance) at the 12th fret is 2.3mm for low E and 1.8mm for high E (individuals may need lower or higher and high spots on the fretboard may limit how low it can go before rattles occur, also an incorrectly adjusted truss rod can hamper low action and playability).

Medium strings are typically 1.4mm diameter for low E - hence the 12th fret action is just over one and a half string diameters for low E.

The fact that the 12th fret is half way along the guitar string means that changing a saddle height by a certain amount (eg raising it by 1mm) will result in a change of action at the 12th fret by half that amount - in this case raising it by 0.5mm.

The saddle profile is designed to make the strings sit in an arc which follows the radius of the fretboard with adjustments to ensure the 12th fret action (string to fret distance at 12th fret) of low (bass or thick wound) E is ~0.5mm higher compared to high (treble or thin) E. If you prefer the difference to be more or less than 0.5mm then we can factor that into the dressing. The extra action for low E A D is basically to allow the bass strings a little more room to vibrate . This action change is graduated to achieve comfortable feel all the way up the fretboard - the smooth arc of the strings also looks great! We use graphics to visualise your saddle design for you before committing to the build.

Its recommended that the width is made a bit larger than the existing slot width and its sanded to fit perfectly by the fitter (this is an easy job and we supply an instruction video and the sandpaper!)

Purely acoustic guitar saddles should be a good snug fit to get maximum coupling from the string to the top of the guitar. Electro-acoustic guitars fitted with an undersaddle pickup should have the saddles fitted so that there's even pressure across the length of the pickup - which sits all the way across the bottom of the saddle slot - hence a snug fitting saddle is still desirable but not so tight so at to prevent the saddle bedding down nicely on the pickup.

TONE TRANSMISSION
Bone, horn or hardwood saddles sound better than plastic ones because harder materials are more efficient at transmitting the strings vibration energy into the guitars bridge and body.


FITTING PRECISION
Often saddles - bone or plastic - are not snug fitting in the saddle slot  and some of the strings energy is lost because of this. A good fitting saddle will always makes an impressive improvement in the tone and loudness.


WEAR AND TEAR
Saddles do wear - often little grooves wear in a well used saddle and these make the transfer of the strings vibration energy into the saddle and bridge less efficient and can cause the string to bind. A new saddle with polished string contact areas - that are the right area as well - massively improve the tone.


LOOK AND STYLE
Our saddles look professional, are highly polished and add to your instruments visual style. Everything we make can be in polished natural bone (yellowy) or bleached bone (white).


BETTER PLAYABILITY FOR LEFT AND RIGHT HAND
Get a better action and playability for the left hand by making the strings follow the fretboard radius. Get the strings in a nice smooth arc shape over the sound hole which helps the right hand.


BETTER NOTE PITCH ACCURACY
Compensation make the notes more accurate - this makes the harmonies between note simply sound better and this results in everything you play sounding better.

Acoustic guitar saddles are often shaped to provide 'compensation' - which results a better sounding and more accurate pitch of the fretted notes.

The length of each individual string is altered by adjusting the string contact point at the saddle. In turn this alters the pitch of fretted notes. On most guitars fretted notes may not vibrate at exactly the ideal pitch (a chromatic tuner will show this). This is due to a variety of effects such as the strings stretching when pressed down into the fret. Saddle compensation design helps to adjust the pitch of the fretted notes to be closer to the ideal.

The closer the pitch of the fretted notes is to the ideal will result in better sounding harmonies between notes (better sounding chords) and a guitar that is more in tune all the way up the fretboard.

We perform many quality control checks during manufacture and prior to dispatch to ensure that you receive a saddle that fits your guitar to your specification. Essentially the better it fits - the better it sounds! It is highly polished - especially where the strings contact it.

• FREE : Fitting instructions showing how best to install a saddle
• FREE : Plenty of abrasives and polishing material - the better the fit the better the tone !
• FREE : A choice of the length, width and height to fit your guitar