About Babicz Full Contact Hardware
Above, the patented eCAM saddle in action
“With electric guitar and bass bridges it’s all about tone…how to get more tone, more stability, more sustain and finer adjustments…without adding weight. This is really what Full Contact Hardware is all about.” – Jeff Babicz
By now most guitarists are familiar with the Babicz Guitar company, an innovative brand that featured Jeff Babicz’s remarkable designs. The company was established in late 2003 by Jeff Babicz and Jeff Carano, veterans of the guitar industry with established track records. As the executive management team for the headless Steinberger Guitar company in the 1980's and early '90's, Babicz and Carano were directly involved in launching innovative technology for the music industry on a global scale. (Click here to read more) What most musicians do not know is that prior to launching Babicz Guitars, Jeff Babicz was working on a new bridge system for his own electric guitar and bass designs.
“It was a consistent problem, even back in the Steinberger days, where bridge saddle locking set screws would come unscrewed, through natural vibrations of the instrument, and the vibrating string was no longer coupled to the bass or guitar bridge. This happened often, and when it did, there was a clear loss of sonic performance. I was constantly working on bridge designs that would get me maximum saddle surface contact and yet maintain all the expected string height and intonation saddle adjustments.” … states Babicz
Above, Jeff Babicz at the Newburgh, NY Steinberger factory showing the 5150 guitar he built for Eddie Van Halen
The first Full Contact Hardware (FCH) prototype bridge was mounted to Jeff Carano’s Fender Jazz bass and the result was immediately prominent. The locked down saddle design dramatically improved sustain while the lightweight materials offered a new level of tonality compared to the original bridge.
In 2008, through years of design refinements, Jeff Babicz officially introduced The Babicz Design "Full Contact Hardware", featuring the patented “eCAM” (short for “encapsulated cam”) saddle design for electric guitars and basses. The FCH bridges offer a dramatic improvement in sustain and tonal quality achieved by eliminating any gaps or voids between the bottom of the bridge saddles and the body of the guitar or bass, as seen in the diagram below.
With FCH, string height or "action" can now be set with more precision. The "eCAM” saddle allows for instant "action" adjustments without ever adding space or air gaps between the saddle and the body of the guitar, and conventional string height action adjustment set screws are eliminated. With the Babicz FCH design, the bridge saddle can never "sink" or "shift" while playing. Each FCH eCAM saddle also includes a specially designed “String Height Lock” feature, which keeps your string height setting in place…even during extreme saddle vibrations over time. Precise intonation adjustments are also easily attained and in most cases include a “Saddle Housing Lock” feature.
