Mi Si pickup installation

I just watched the video here on UU of Joe Souza installing a Mi Si in a Kanile'a uke. He routs the slot in the bridge deeper to accomodate the transducer's thickness. I was just going to take a little bit off of the bottom of the saddle itself, but after watching Joe I wonder if I should do it his way. I think I'd rather have to make a new saddle than bridge if I mess it up, but I'm sure there is some reason why he routs the bridge instead. I wonder if he leaves the new slot shy of the ends of the saddle to hide some of the thickness of the transducer. He is only taking off about .023 and the transducer measures .037. That still leaves a little gap, but less than if not routed at all. The ends of my saddle are visible, as the slot runs straight through, so the gap created by the transducer will be visible also. Any ideas how to proceed??

While I have thought about doing this, have not actually pulled the trigger. The key is the jig he uses to route the bridge. The other thing that bothered me is the way he drilled the hole for the jack. Could just see my drill bit catching the uke and ripping out the bottom. Maybe the step drill he uses makes a difference.
Always though the practice on guitars was to remove material from the bottom of the saddle, so I have the same question. My kanilea has a pretty shallow saddle slot so maybe that has something to do with it.

I'm not sure what Joe does, haven't watched the video. I assume you're talking about the MiSi Simple Jack with the LR Baggs UST.......I've installed a bunch of these with good success. The general rule of thumb is that 2/3 of the saddle should be in the slot while 1/3 is exposed above the bridge. So if your saddle slot is shallow you may need to deepen it to make up for the thickness of the UST. Mine are plenty deep to allow for pickup installation.
The attached pics are self explanatory. I drill an outbound hole as well (45 degree angle) to accommodate the leading 1/2" of the element which is pretty inactive. If you want the MiSi Installation PDF I can email it to you.

Moore Bettah Ukuleles said:

I'm not sure what Joe does, haven't watched the video. I assume you're talking about the MiSi Simple Jack with the LR Baggs UST.......I've installed a bunch of these with good success. The general rule of thumb is that 2/3 of the saddle should be in the slot while 1/3 is exposed above the bridge. So if your saddle slot is shallow you may need to deepen it to make up for the thickness of the UST. Mine are plenty deep to allow for pickup installation.
The attached pics are self explanatory. I drill an outbound hole as well (45 degree angle) to accommodate the leading 1/2" of the element which is pretty inactive. If you want the MiSi Installation PDF I can email it to you.

Click to expand...

If you could just send me the uke Chuck; that would be nice. It is beautiful!

Thank you Mr. Moore, for explaining that rule of thumb. I, too, had been wondering why not just sand the saddle down. Now it makes sense.

Sadly, it means that I'm gonna have to remove the neck of my CBU and fix the angle, so the action is a little lower. I was just going to carve a new, lower neck.

Now, I'll do both... and install the pickup while I'm at it.

Thanks for all the replies. Maybe I should rephrase the question, I might have been a little vague in my original post. On my bridge you can see both ends of the saddle where they contact the wood since the slot runs all the way thru the bridge. After inserting the UST, it lifts the saddle by the thickness of the UST. My saddle slot is deep enough not to have to rout it deeper, but since the ends of the saddle are visible, the gap created by the UST thickness is also visible. The pickup works and sounds great, but cosmetically (and I may be suffering from OCD here) that little gap bugs me. Am I just splitting hairs here, or does anyone else worry about this?

dustartist said:

Thanks for all the replies. Maybe I should rephrase the question, I might have been a little vague in my original post. On my bridge you can see both ends of the saddle where they contact the wood since the slot runs all the way thru the bridge. After inserting the UST, it lifts the saddle by the thickness of the UST. My saddle slot is deep enough not to have to rout it deeper, but since the ends of the saddle are visible, the gap created by the UST thickness is also visible. The pickup works and sounds great, but cosmetically (and I may be suffering from OCD here) that little gap bugs me. Am I just splitting hairs here, or does anyone else worry about this?

Click to expand...

It is what it is. Do I worry about it? Yes - this is why I now do a closed end saddle slot. If you're doing a Fishman, you need to install it in a certain place due to its fixed length - you may or may not end up with overhang of the saddle. With the MiSi, because it uses a LR Baggs element pickup, you can drill it to almost as wide as the saddle if you wanted. Just be sure your holes are angled and ramped.

Either way, will you still be able to see the pickup element from the ends? Yes. Will it look like "a UST was installed after the fact"? Yes. What if the factory did it? It'll look like it was installed after the fact.

-Aaron