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  #1  
Old 05-23-2018, 08:27 AM
bluesfreek bluesfreek is offline
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Thumbs up Tusq saddle makes a difference!

I installed a new Tusq saddle in my Yamaha SCF08 plywood dread yesterday. The original was plastic. After doing a little sanding I got a perfect fit and height. The material was easy to work with.

The first thing I noticed is the sustain has improved and the tone is a little different in a good way. Much more string balance overall and the plain treble strings sound better. The plastic saddle made the tone harsh but now with a Tusq saddle it's smooth with more resonance. It even seems to play better.

For $12 and about an hour of my time this was a worthy upgrade!
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  #2  
Old 05-23-2018, 08:53 AM
rlb9682 rlb9682 is offline
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That's great to hear! I love the Tusq saddles. I'm glad you're enjoying the change!
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Old 05-23-2018, 09:53 AM
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I like Tusq as well. I understand the uniformity (vs natural bone) and have no interest in bone.

I really dislike plastic.

The first thing I do with any new guitar is replace plastic nuts and saddles with Tusq, the second thing I do is replace plastic bridge pins with ebony or tusq.
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Old 05-23-2018, 10:07 AM
bausin bausin is offline
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Did you put on new strings or keep the old ones?
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Old 05-23-2018, 10:22 AM
bluesfreek bluesfreek is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rlb9682 View Post
That's great to hear! I love the Tusq saddles. I'm glad you're enjoying the change!
Yeah I am glad I made the swap to Tusq. It's given this guitar a new sound and life. I got it used for a steal at $90 CDN. The original owner bought and hardly played it for 8-9 years. The guitar is in perfect condition so I figured it deserves a better saddle than a crappy plastic one.

The only Tusq saddle the shop had that fit was the Taylor replacement saddle. It even has the correct radius. It's about 1/8th of an inch less in length than the old saddle though. None the less I positioned it in the slot properly and it's perfect. The compensated portion of the saddle works nicely for the B string intonation.

For an inexpensive plywood guitar it sounded pretty good to begin with but with the new Tusq saddle it sounds even better.
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Old 05-23-2018, 10:26 AM
bluesfreek bluesfreek is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bausin View Post
Did you put on new strings or keep the old ones?
Since the ones on it are only a month old I kept them on. I also wanted to hear if there was a change in tone with the same strings on it before the new saddle. The strings are D'Addario PB .011-.052
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Old 05-23-2018, 10:33 AM
bluesfreek bluesfreek is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fazool View Post
I like Tusq as well. I understand the uniformity (vs natural bone) and have no interest in bone.

I really dislike plastic.

The first thing I do with any new guitar is replace plastic nuts and saddles with Tusq, the second thing I do is replace plastic bridge pins with ebony or tusq.
Replacing the plastic bridge pins on both my steel string acoustics is my next course of action. Luckily the nut on the Yamaha although made of plastic is cut perfectly with excellent string action on the first few frets. I don't need to replace it.

My Sigma 000 came with bone nut and saddle from the factory and to me it sounds wonderful so I do not intend to mess with it.

From now on any guitar I get that has a plastic saddle will get a new Tusq replacement one.
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Old 05-23-2018, 11:44 AM
C_Becker C_Becker is offline
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It definitely does, I put one in my Epiphone last week and it improved the treble response and sustain quite a bit.

If you drop a Tusq saddle on your table, you can hear how hard the material is.
I guess it transfers the string vibrations very nicely due to that.
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Old 05-23-2018, 11:47 AM
Ned Milburn Ned Milburn is offline
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Tusq is a proprietary brand name for a plastic composition. Sure, it WILL be better than a softer plastic, but most of us who have changed 100 or more Tusq saddles to bone will MOSTLY agree that bone sounds even clearer with a crisper high-end.

Glad you are enjoying your mod and good on you for the DIY.
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Old 05-23-2018, 04:47 PM
BT55 BT55 is offline
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Tusq is a great material but so is Bone. There are many threads discussing Bone vs. Tusq and the answer seems to be the guitar determines the difference. The only consensus seems to be anything but plastic for the bridge saddle.
Same is true for Bridge Pins. Each guitar is different and many sound good with plastic but Bone or Tusq are the answer for other guitars.
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Old 05-23-2018, 05:28 PM
bluesfreek bluesfreek is offline
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I may try a bone saddle in the future just to see if it suits this guitar. I intend to use it as my experimental guitar.
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Old 05-23-2018, 05:58 PM
mirwa mirwa is offline
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I am glad it made an improvement for you, but tusq is just plastic in another form.

Possibly it may be playing better due to the attention you gave to the shape and height of the strings when you fitted them to the nut, you then play and appreciate what you have done.

Either way, an improvement is an improvement

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Old 05-23-2018, 06:26 PM
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fazool fazool is offline
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Much more to the story of plastics

There are junk plastics like garbage bags and disposable cups and then there are highly engineered plastics with very high performance characteristics.

I dislike plastics on my guitars (plastic binding, plastic nuts, pins etc) mostly because that thing we call "plastic" is usually very low performing, low quality , low cost junk. BUT, I would never mix up really high quality or specialized high performance or engineered plastics with those.

These days it's all lumped together as "plastic" which seems to automatically carry the lowest common denominator of quality & performance.

A wood analogy would be "pallets are made of yellow pine. I wouldn't call Brazilian rosewood in the same category simply because it's all wood"

So, many kinds of plastics. Most are low grade stuff. But the good stuff can be really good. It's too bad we just call it plastic.
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  #14  
Old 05-23-2018, 08:57 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fazool View Post
...I dislike plastics on my guitars (plastic binding, plastic nuts, pins etc) mostly because that thing we call "plastic" is usually very low performing, low quality , low cost junk. BUT, I would never mix up really high quality or specialized high performance or engineered plastics with those...
Context does make a difference - all plastics are not equal. Where you dislike "plastic" binding and pins, I think ivoroid binding is an elegant material. My favorite pins are Antique Acoustics, which are high quality plastic. There are no pins that I favor over those at any price.

To the OP's experience, I suspect the Tusq is much better quality than the original material, and as Steve suggests, perhaps is fits better than therefore performs better. Bone is still my first choice in saddles. I far prefer it to Tusq, and fossil ivory for that matter. But part of the fun in being able to do things yourself is that you can learn by experience without spending a fortune.
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Old 05-24-2018, 04:00 AM
mirwa mirwa is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fazool View Post
These days it's all lumped together as "plastic" which seems to automatically carry the lowest common denominator of quality & performance.

A wood analogy would be "pallets are made of yellow pine. I wouldn't call Brazilian rosewood in the same category simply because it's all wood"

So, many kinds of plastics. Most are low grade stuff. But the good stuff can be really good. It's too bad we just call it plastic.
Agreed, I over simplify, if it melts when I grind it on the sander then I just go yep, plastic.

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