A bit of #lunchtimelutherie - replacing a bridge on a ‘61 Gibson Les Paul reissue. GUITAR NERD CONTENT.

Quick aside: “But that’s not a Les Paul!”

It is, every ‘SG’ produced between ‘61 and ‘63 is a ‘new shape’ Les Paul. Les removed his endorsement in ‘63 (he was getting divorced and it screwed the finances) so the Les Paul became the SG.

When Gibson reissue a historic guitar (this one is from 2005) they usually get key bits wrong (on purpose) to protect their custom shop output I guess... In this instance they’ve put the ‘Nashville’ bridge on it rather than the period correct German made ABR-1.

Let’s fix that!

First step is to remove the nashville inserts, screw into the top and force them out of the body. Simple task!

Some finish cracking from the original install at the factory

Good job I’m replacing it. One of the Graphtech saddles that the previous owner installed has broken!

You can see here the size difference of the Nashville to the ABR-1.

Now to install the new (but aged!) Faber inserts, they’re much longer than the Nashville ones on the right. For this I’ll need my trusty hammer that I made in college!

Inserts in. You can see here how the previous owner has tried to put a Vibrola on the guitar but the ground wire has been an afterthought! Just dragged a wire out of the treble side tailpiece hole and shoved the bare wire under the tree unit. Savages...

Thread the thumb wheels on and the German Faber ABR-1 drops straight onto the new posts. Now to clean, restring, set up and intonate.

All done, looking way closer to a ‘61 Les Paul. Just need to shorten the posts slightly next restring.