Okay, that's my plan then, to make the relief in the saddle. It's going to be much cheaper/easier to do that over than if I screw up the bridge. I think I'll wait a while anyway before adding the pickup and just play it. I'm not in a huge hurry to drill through my end graft and cover it up with the strap button.
I'm not sure how you are going to make a relief the saddle. The LR Baggs pickup ribbon, which is also what is used in the Mi-Si acoustic trio (which is what Joe Sousza is installing in that video) is so very thin, that during installation of the Mi-Si in 3 different instruments, all I had to do was sand the bottom edge of the saddle enough to take off as much as the thickness of the pickup ribbon to maintain the same string height and action from the bridge.
I am not sure why you would route the saddle slot in the bridge as Joe shows in the video, and if you do this and make a mistake, you have to replace the whole bridge, whereas to make a new saddle (if you go too far and sand it too short) is so much easier and cheaper...
Just make sure that the bottom of the saddle is absolutely flat, as well as the bottom of the saddle slot, as you need the pickup ribbon to have as perfect and flat contact as possible in order for it to function properly. You might want to invest in
these saddle slot files.
Also, as Chuck said, and Joe shows in the video, you need to have a hole at each end of the saddle slot, (yes two holes and this is not optional) one for the pickup to come up from inside the body, and the other one is for the tip end of the ribbon (about 8-10mm or so) to be inserted back inside to hold the ribbon down, as well as make sure that the speaking part of the ribbon has full contact with the saddle.
the end tip of these LR Baggs pickups from about 10mm from the end is much less sensitive than the rest of the flat part (before it goes round in profile) and if you place the part that is up to 10mm from very end, under the string, it will have either no volume or decreased volume and you will have to remove it and drill the second hole any way.
However, if you are determined to route the saddle slot, Home Depot and many hardware stores, as well as Amazon sells a hard plastic 'plunge router attachment' for your dremel-type rotary tool for like $25, (see
here) otherwise StewMac has one made of brass and aluminum for $54, see
here.
-Booli