I wish I'd seen this one sooner... there are people on the forum who are content with unfinished fret ends, and they're content with the kind of action compromises you have to make when you use a bridge with an un-adjustable radius of 12" though the strings coming off a compound neck hit the bridge at a 19" radius. Of course you can play it... and Jimmy Page used a Danelectro, and Leslie West used a Les Paul Jr.
But we can do better now. If I was wedded to either a tune-o-matic or wraparound conceptually, I would get a 12" straight radius neck. Which I like just fine, anyway, the compound radius is a great improvement over Fenders with a 7.5" or 9.5" straight radius but the 12" eliminates the problems that existed with those. A tune-o-matic can have the saddles ground to a 19" radius, but the wraparounds... well, it depends. It looks like the Gotoh 510 or something similar could be adjusted by grinding individual saddles, but a straight bar couldn't. The PRS tailpiece plays well, but they've built it for the radius of their necks, which I do not know. The way I see it, I don't have the talent of a Jimmy Page to overcome equipment that isn't optimally set-up; but I am kind of the fanatic here that way.
Have you ever noticed how friggin' out-of-tune Jimmy Page was playing that Danelectro?
But we can do better now. If I was wedded to either a tune-o-matic or wraparound conceptually, I would get a 12" straight radius neck. Which I like just fine, anyway, the compound radius is a great improvement over Fenders with a 7.5" or 9.5" straight radius but the 12" eliminates the problems that existed with those. A tune-o-matic can have the saddles ground to a 19" radius, but the wraparounds... well, it depends. It looks like the Gotoh 510 or something similar could be adjusted by grinding individual saddles, but a straight bar couldn't. The PRS tailpiece plays well, but they've built it for the radius of their necks, which I do not know. The way I see it, I don't have the talent of a Jimmy Page to overcome equipment that isn't optimally set-up; but I am kind of the fanatic here that way.
Have you ever noticed how friggin' out-of-tune Jimmy Page was playing that Danelectro?
