Bone vs. Plastic bridge pins

[M.W.P.]

I made the switch from plastic to tusq pins several months back and really like them.

[Charmed Life Picks]

Originally Posted by TKT

True that, but plastic also has very little variation except in the shell inlay. Martin wants consistency. Bone has too much character, and can also be inconsistent in density. But I agree, some guitars want their plastic pins! For mine I have yet to put in bone and not find an improvement, if just in looks, but I also make sure they fit exactly. I wish Martin had ivoroid pins as an option.

TKT, agreed. However, many also use TUSQ, due to its consistency, although I've got to believe that Martin has tested all the options out there and still returns to plastic.

sm

[rusty string]

antique acoustic are the only pins that will go on my guitars. anything but plastic changes the tone and the antique acoustic are the best out there.

[Mr. Jelly]

Often the fit of the pins has more effect than the material. Most people don't give it a thought and believe it's all about material.

[Rodger Knox]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

Often the fit of the pins has more effect than the material. Most people don't give it a thought and believe it's all about material.

That bears repeating.

[jbeecham]

The other factor to consider (which has been mentioned in other threads) is the fit. I have replaced plastic pins with bone. The bone pins had a tighter fit and the tone did improve. I don't know if the pin material or the snug fit or both caused the change in tone.

jerry

[stringjunky]

Any Martin made after 1930 had plastic pins and that includes the OM45 Deluxe. If you use anything other than plastic, your Martin is not authentic or historically correct.

http://earlymartin.com/bridgepins.html

[Dustinfurlow]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

Often the fit of the pins has more effect than the material. Most people don't give it a thought and believe it's all about material.

Very good point. The bones pins I used weren't specifically fit for the Larrivee, although they were snug. Might need to try Larrivee bone pins, if I don't like em I can just have them as spares. The kinds I used that deadened the tone were plain Bob Colosi pins so I doubt they were inferior material or anything like that.

[Silly Moustache]

Bridge pins and the holes they fit are not standardised.

There are differing tapers used. I believe that most/any folk in the USA buy bone and FWI pins, nuts and saddles from a chap called Bob Colosi, but his website has interesting info on tapers see here :

http://www.guitarsaddles.com/products.asp

You need to scroll down a bit.

[Shiftyboy]

There's so much mythology related to bridge pins, I think. Let's think about this logically: The string is under tension when it passes over the saddle. Along with the fret you are pressing behind, or the nut in the case of an open string, the saddle determines the effective string length to make the note. The saddle of course, also transmits the vibration through the bridge to the guitar body. The point is, the string isn't vibrating on the pin side of the saddle. So how can bridge pins affect tone? I just got done building a OM style guitar--my first build. When the glue dried on the bridge I couldn't wait for the ebony pins I had ordered, so I strung it up with some old plastic pins I had lying around. It sounded great, I am thrilled to report. When the ebony pins came, put them in and it sounded just the same to me!
So saddle and nut material can affect tone. Bridge pins, methinks not!

[Fresh1985]

I only really change bridge pins for aesthetic reasons but when I changed from ebony to ivoroid I thought I noticed more clarity. Impossible to know if it was the pins or not though, too many variables to consider.

[AcousticDreams]

Originally Posted by Dustinfurlow

The other day I took some plastic bridge pins off of my lady's Larrivee and replaced with bone and it completely killed the tone. Was very surprised. It's a Italian/Mahogany 12-fretter that had plenty of life and sustain to it but then all of a sudden sounded dull. This was right after putting new strings on. I tried doing the same to one of my guitars with ebony pins and the same thing happened, dead strings.

In the past I had an engelmann/walnut Larrivee and replaced its ebony bins with the bone and it brightened it up so much it made me sick.

Just think it's crazy how much little pins can affect sound. It's worth experimenting if you have a guitar you're not crazy about. Maybe try that simple change and see what happens. I always thought just the saddle, nut and strings were determining factors since company's like Martin will put plastic pins on their D-28s but nope!

Happy picking

I would say that there is a reasonable possibility that if your lady's Larrivee had plastic pins...then it probably has a tusc saddle as well. For many years that is what was used. So for fun, try the same experiment replacing the saddle with bone. Then switch back and forth between Bone and plastic. You might get totally different results then...with the possibility that the bone pins will give a more lively response than plastic pins.
And also, look at the differences in the skirt between the bone and plastic pins. Is the groove on the skirt on the plastic cut through? and how does that compare to the bone's skirt?

[Placida]

Originally Posted by Shiftyboy

So saddle and nut material can affect tone. Bridge pins, methinks not!

Agree about the bridge pins.

What does matter is the position of the ball end of the string on the bridge plate. That's why i slot the bridges and plates on all my guitars. That solid connectivity of the string to the bridge plate is what makes a great deal of difference in tone of the guitar. Wedging the ball end between a plastic pin and the edge of the pinhole is not an effective way of transmitting sound to the top.

[brianmay]

Originally Posted by Charmed Life Picks

That Martin still uses plastic pins on their D models (correct?) tells me everything they need to know. They've gotten it right for close to 200 years, so I kinda trust them to get it right these days too.

At the quantities they would buy them, bone would not cost them much more than plastic, so on a $3000 guitar I don't see this as a cost-cutting measure.

memmer

I've got some bone pins from Bob Colossi a couple of years back, but haven't used them because as in the comment above I reckon Martin, who had all the choice of just about any material, chose plastic. Works for me.

[Jambi]

I wonder how pinless bridges like Breedloves factor into this conversation. I guess it would come down to bridge material and saddle.