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Hi, The action on the violin was too high, I took an afternoon this past Christmas and used large magnifying glasses and an exacto knife and cut -very carefully- deeper grooves into the bridge for the strings to rest in. Action is lowered and it's playing OK, for learning purposes, but should I shave the top of the bridge and shape it
to get rid of the very tiny amount of bridge essentially sticking up between the strings? Should the strings be resting on the bridge or can they sit into the grooves? The green color is a styrofoam bit that I used as a groove liner because I saw someone else's violin with such a thing on it and thought it could soften the sound (I don't think it does anything?)
Mark
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Check this pdf article out.
https://fiddlerman.com/forum/t.....ridge-pdf/
The grooves should NOT be any deeper than about 1/3 of the string diameter.
Keep in mind the E string will likely have a sleeve and sometimes the A string has one too, use them if you have them, but the groove depth is still 1/3 of string diameter or less.
"If you practice with your hands you must practice all day. Practice with your mind and you can accomplish the same amount in minutes." Nathan Milstein
In that case would the string diameter measurement include the little plastic sleeve, because that would make the string thicker, so .33 of string plus sleeve?
The sleeve is extremely thin walled so it will not come into play. The sleeve is there to help stop the string from cutting into the bridge. There is what is called afterlength. This is the string from the bridge to the tailpiece. If the bridge encapsulates the string very little vibratiion will reach the afterlength causing a loss in tone. You basically want the string to rest on top of the bridge with a groove just deep enough to keep the string there.
ELCBK
Fiddlerman
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