getting some support to a worn bridge bridge plate on a 90s epiphone

 

 

 Have a bridge plate that is sucking the string ends right up into it.

Because I rescued an old Epi, one of a type that I'd missed ever since trading it super long back.  Had tried to re-acquire some yet one had severe tarnations going on with it which wasn't foreseeable to the efforts of repair. Then this one came along and it has some fighting spirit to it.

Main steps and procedures are the repairs I can get to myself without dropping bombastic amounts of cash which tiny college towns can sometimes demand. or in other ways too, simply trying to fix what I can possibly be  capable of doing. 

The back up plates for traditional bridge pin styles don't apply here because the bridge of this Korean-made Epi had a bowing curve to the bridge area.
One of those "platemates" could have served a function to repair this more easily.

Instead I am taking materials and figuring out any tone changes while at the same time ensuring that no more string pressure will dig deeper into that bridge plate material.

I tried a stainless steel strip which really boosted and prolonged sustain. But there was a metal and robot-string sound to it which did not sit quite right. 
However I returned to this a few times. The boost and power of the sound was quite admirable with this. But that taking away of the woody depth of the bass end of the strings wasn't a fair trade for that sustain.  Things were sounding really metallic and it wasn't preferable.  I swapped between this and a wood backing several times.
Those platemates were made out of brass but this material is stainless streel, and while I didn't have any brass around at all to try into, I was left wondering about any difference in reverberation and getting the vibrations through past this protector, from the string ends into the original (rosewood) bridge plate.

I'd found maple wood to use. And I'm not far in to using different materials or anything yet.
I found with a piece this thick that the reverberation and volume subsided a lot.
However the woodiness of the sound, the bass lows, stayed truer. But it wasn't "shaking up" and vibrating the body of the instrument.
Note the marks there are not surface cracks. I'd pulled that block out and sanded it down some.
Still left that piece about as thick however. Comparing blockiness to thinner pieces, still thinking about a transfer of the vibration to not sacrifice too much of the fuller sound for bridge plate protection.

 

I'd made this smaller and thinner piece, still out of maple,
and found this to be fine enough for the moment.
There were multiple makes of maple sizes and I found with the material
they would very much so split if trying to go too think, or too close in to the bridge pin hole cuts.
Also exact, exact measurements are ever so needed. A little off and you're having to widen those bridge pin holes and they arent holding in securely whatoever.  The bowing curve of this bridge pin/hole style makes that really annoying and a disband and start all over kind of process.
Had some that really were nice and thin pieces but were off in measurement, so huck it,
or so near being thin that a crack would split right in.
So with this, I'll take it for now, and play using this piece.
I'm getting volume still, my plate isn't going to sink in via the string ball ends having questionable surface it digs into, and it is not sounding metallic or overly steel like.
If I can find rosewood or a wood type called bubinga, I may opt to cut some very thin pieces that will not split.   It's possible in the future to replace the entire bridge plate and that would likely opt for the best instrument sound.
One more thing however is I am going to change strings also I put DR strings on there. My first pack of those came unraveled as heck as they are hand wound strings.
This maple block idea may have a better answer sticking another string brand and even gauge onto the guitar.

Also note that I worked the bridge pin holes to be able to have each pin push in equal all the way across. These are the original pins but strangely enough were sounding better (before and after a bridge protector were tried out) than bone pin replacements.  I may try some of that Tusq material, but they need to be longer sized pins. Some of those shorter types aren't going to work if there is wood beyond the original rosewood bridge plate.

Will hope to post which guitar this is as I go along with more things on it.  Was very finicky and selective for this certain type of guitar, from the 90s and being something I'd basically attached to and bonded to quite well before ignorantly trading it out for an X-Series martin guitar which I'd later trade that one. 
Super happy to have a playable version of this Epiphone back and into the spirit of song writing and perhaps a bit of some newer creative momentum.