<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; ">Sounds like what I have done a number of times. Only in the capo section, though, and I've always done it to help clean up false beats and get better termination, so I when I did it I was thinking more of "filling in the gap" than "saturating the wood," and was trying to keep the surface of the bridge as clean as practical. So I would want to change the mind set, maybe leave time for soak in and actually paint the surface nice and wet, then clean off excess. I'm thinking it would make sense to try the bottom unisons of a tenor bridge, to see what effect it might have. Not sure if I can fit that in this summer or not, at this point. <DIV><SPAN class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </SPAN>But some experiments with discarded (but not yet thrown in the stove) bridges or just some maple emulating them might help in developing techniques. Or might show that it really isn't worth the bother, if the effect is negligible. How far will CA or epoxy penetrate? How much of a vapor barrier will the residue on the outside of the bridge be? Probably impossible to answer those questions, but at least one could find out how much a bit of bridge that was treated expanded and contracted compared with one that wasn't treated. (I do know that both epoxy and CA can "penetrate" enough to be forced from the bottom of one hole up into the neighbor hole, when I pound in a pin. More like being forced through the grain, but it means the material has migrated).<BR><DIV> <SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><DIV>Regards,</DIV><DIV>Fred Sturm</DIV><DIV>University of New Mexico</DIV><DIV><A href="mailto:fssturm@unm.edu">fssturm@unm.edu</A></DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"></SPAN></SPAN> </DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Jun 12, 2007, at 12:48 PM, Ron Nossaman wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Hi Ron,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">When you say epoxy or CA saturation, what do you mean in terms of method used to saturate? Are these methods one could use on an existing bridge in a piano?</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Regards,</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Fred Sturm</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Existing bridges in pianos is what I've done this on forever (though I drive pins in new bridges with epoxy too). First, I always pull the old pins, drill the holes deep enough that the new pin won't bottom out (and size the holes to replace #6 with #7 if they'll fit), and clean up the notches and bridge top. A disposable hypodermic syringe, without needle, to put a dab of epoxy in each hole, and drive in the new pins to finish height. No, I don't bottom them, no, there is no acoustical detriment to not bottoming them that I can detect, and no, I don't file them. Then, depending on how it looks, how the pins felt going in, or if I just don't feel lucky, I'll brush on some epoxy around the pins and heat it in with a heat gun or even a hair dryer. Dry brush mop up the overflow, and a spray coat of McLube to knock the gloss off the epoxy after it's cured. Done.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">If you're not replacing pins (*not* recommended) a top coat of epoxy around the pins, heated in until it won't take more, dry brush cleanup, and McLube. Or thin CA, goobered on around the pins until it won't absorb more, mop up with rags, and McLube. No accelerator.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">The McLube is strictly to cut the gloss and make the thing look neater than you actually left it. It offers no lubrication benefit.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">This will get you the best termination with the least effort of anything I've found, and does indeed seem to improve tuning stability.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Ron N</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>