An Improved Bridge for Stringed Musical Instruments.
Year: 1898

page_text: Date of Application, 11th Jan., 1898-Accepted, 26th Mar., 1898
CUMPLID DI MULTIVATION.
[Communicated from abroad by JAMES E. MAYNADIER, of 801-3 Sears Building,
199, Washington Street, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America,
Attorney-at-Law.]
An Improved Bridge for Stringed Musical Instruments.
I, HENRY HARRIS LAKE, of the Firm of Haseltine, Lake & Co., Patent Agents,
45, Southampton Buildings, in the County of Middlesex, do hereby declare the
nature of this invention and in what manner the same is to be performed, to
be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement: -
Figure 1 is a plan of a portion of a zither showing my pin bridge in place;
Figure 2 is a section on line 2-2 of Fig. 1.
My invention is a new bridge for string instruments and consists in pins each
provided near its upper end with a shoulder over which a string passes while the
portion of the pin above the shoulder serves as a guide for the string, each of these
pins passing through a bridge and the sounding board and into the pin block of the
instrument.
In the drawings A is the bridge, B the sounding board, D the pin block, for the
tuning pins E, and F the bridge pins each with a shoulder f. Each string G
extends from its tuning pin E over the shoulder f of its bridge pin F, that shoulder f
For the best results the
forming with the bridge A my new pin bridge.
shoulder should be flush with the upper edge of the bridge A, and that part of the
bridge pin F which is above the sounding board B should fit in a hole through
bridge A; for the function of bridge A is to prevent vibration of the upper part of
the bridge pin F.
The function of the shoulder f is to support the string G, and the function of
that part of the pin immediately above shoulder f is to stay the string; but obviously
one or more ordinary stay pins may be used between bridge pin F and tuning pin E,
although one advantage of my new pin bridge is that it effectually prevents after
tones due to the vibration of that part of the string between the bridge and the
But the main
tuning pin, if the tuning pin E be not too far from bridge A.
advantage of my new pin bridge is that each string is supported and stayed in the
most perfect manner and that the quality of tone is much improved. In practice I
bore the bridge A for the pins F, and then force each pin through the sounding
board B and well into the pin block D, and while the shoulder f of pins F need not
be against bridge A yet, for the best results I prefer to slightly imbed shoulders f
in the upper surface of bridge A, and thereby the shoulder on each pin acts to
clamp the bridge A and sounding board B against pin block D, which not only
improves the construction of the instrument but also improves the tone, and
practically does away with the need of stay pins between the bridge pins F and tuning
pins E.

page_text: Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed, as communicated to me
by my foreign correspondent, I declare that what I claim is :-
In a string instrument the pin bridge above described made up of shouldered pins
and a bridge, the pins extending through the bridge and sounding board and into
the pin block, the shoulders of the pins supporting the strings and the heads of the
pins staying the strings, all substantially as set forth.
lion day of January 1098.
HASELTINE, LAKE & Co.,
45, Southampton Buildings, London, W.C., Agents for the Applicant.