action, neck shim and saddle lock screw

[john o]

to ease the pain of the Eagles' suboptimal performance against the Seahawks,
i was on a quest to improve the action on my trib ASAT special this afternoon. the trussrod setting was optimal re: relief,
but the action was a little high and the bridge saddles were set relatively low.
as has been discussed here previously, i thought a shim under the proximal part of the neck would remedy this.
i was able to remove the neck without problem. the neck pocket is pretty tight. I cut a business card to fit the pocket well and with about 1.3 inch width, and punched the 2 nail holes in it. i thought 1 card would not be enough and put 2 cards on top of each other. this assumption was incorrect, and when i strung up after reattaching the neck, the strings were sitting on the frets and i had to set the bridge saddles pretty high for proper action without buzz. i removed the neck again, reduced the shim to one business card shim and this adjustment turned out to be optimal, re: string action and bridge saddle height. I am
just wanted to share the experience for anyone who has encountered a similar problem, on the trib asat.

question: as an aside, i seem not to have received the side bridge saddle lock adjustment screw with my trib asat. is it safe to assume the screw is the same for the usa made and trib models? if the dealer does not have one lying around, i may try to get one from the G&L online store. thanks.

[Craig]

question: as an aside, i seem not to have received the side bridge saddle lock adjustment screw with my trib asat. is it safe to assume the screw is the same for the usa made and trib models? if the dealer does not have one lying around, i may try to get one from the G&L online store. thanks.

No, it is not safe to make that assumption. See ASAT Saddle Lock Set Screw Size.

[john o]

interesting, thx for the reference.
i also never received the screw that goes with the tremolo arm on my trib legacy.
i don't use the trem very often, and when i do, it doesn't seem the screw would be necessary, for light use, a song or two.

[john o]

reduced the shim to one business card shim and this adjustment turned out to be optimal, re: string action and bridge saddle height...

[GeorgeB]

Excellent thread, John!
On my Tribute ASAT Special I got away with the factory setup. I tend to prefer medium action at the upper end of the fretboard and use heavy gauge strings (11-56) and saddle height turned out to be pefect for this. With softer strings I might have needed a shim. For shims I like to use copper sheet metal (0.2mm thickness) as I find it is both solid and flexible enough for a perfect shim and it is thin enough to stack up wedged shims (with zig-zag pattern). This is required whenever you need to actually lower the string height at the bridge with a shim by decreasing neck angle, rather than by filing down the neck heel. Had to do this on my Invader because saddles ended up too high, running out of adjustment range (including the saddle lock) and increasing risk of string breakage.

[john o]

that's interesting about the copper shim, should be fairly simple to trim at that thickness.
i was wondering about the stability of the business card over time.
i have noticed on the trib asat special that the string grooves in the nut are fairly narrow.
i use a little lube and tuning has not been a problem. do you have problems with tuning, using the heavier gauge strings, from sticking at the nut?