setting up a bronco
Posted: Fri Apr 08, 2011 4:40 pm
First post here. For the last year or so, I have been looking for a clean original bronco, finally found one at my price point. A red 1974, dirty, beat, neglected, but all there. I pretty much had to get it set up from scratch. This site was very helpful, with good pix of the tremolo parts, but nothing really step by step, so I thought I would share my experience.
I have played for years, but am not extremely handy, and generally have my guitars set up by folks who do it for a living. I don't feel competent to do anything with the frets or nut, so if they became an issue, I planned to back off. Fortunately, they were OK.
1. First step was to take the bridge and trem assembly apart. I cleaned it up with some soap and water, and a bit of wd40 to get the rust off the working parts. No intent to make it look new, but it was funky enough to interfere with functionality (the tiny screw that holds the trem bar in place needed the most TLC).
2. I removed the neck, and got it straight adjusting the truss rod. There is a notched access to the truss rod screw, but it is easier to adjust with the neck off. I started it at dead straight, with the option to adjust it later.
3. The bridge posts adjust the string height, but there are some limits. First, make sure that the string tension pulls the bridge plate into the notches on the posts. Second, you cannot screw the posts all the way down without locking down the trem. It needs to be high enough so that the bridge plate goes up and down smoothly with the trem action without clicking.
4. At this point, the trem was working fine, but the action was too high. Since the bridge could not go down any further without spoiling the trem functionality, that means that the neck had to come up. I got satisfactory results by adding a shim in the neck pocket (I had to experiment a bit with different thicknesses).
5. The last step was to set the intonation. Basically, you unscrew the saddle and adjust its position so that you are in tune at with an open string, and at the 12th fret.
I think I have this all correct, but would appreciate corrections or suggestions. I will follow up with a post that links the photos I used.
I have played for years, but am not extremely handy, and generally have my guitars set up by folks who do it for a living. I don't feel competent to do anything with the frets or nut, so if they became an issue, I planned to back off. Fortunately, they were OK.
1. First step was to take the bridge and trem assembly apart. I cleaned it up with some soap and water, and a bit of wd40 to get the rust off the working parts. No intent to make it look new, but it was funky enough to interfere with functionality (the tiny screw that holds the trem bar in place needed the most TLC).
2. I removed the neck, and got it straight adjusting the truss rod. There is a notched access to the truss rod screw, but it is easier to adjust with the neck off. I started it at dead straight, with the option to adjust it later.
3. The bridge posts adjust the string height, but there are some limits. First, make sure that the string tension pulls the bridge plate into the notches on the posts. Second, you cannot screw the posts all the way down without locking down the trem. It needs to be high enough so that the bridge plate goes up and down smoothly with the trem action without clicking.
4. At this point, the trem was working fine, but the action was too high. Since the bridge could not go down any further without spoiling the trem functionality, that means that the neck had to come up. I got satisfactory results by adding a shim in the neck pocket (I had to experiment a bit with different thicknesses).
5. The last step was to set the intonation. Basically, you unscrew the saddle and adjust its position so that you are in tune at with an open string, and at the 12th fret.
I think I have this all correct, but would appreciate corrections or suggestions. I will follow up with a post that links the photos I used.
