The six string in the above picture is sitting on a guitar stand next to my bass rig; so I went and looked at it for a while. The strings pass over the bridge saddles and on to the tailpiece in a straight line. The string slots and screw holes on the tailpiece are evenly spaced so that they don't interfere with each other, and are visually balanced on the tailpiece. If you moved the tailpiece over so that it was centered on the middle Purpleheart lam, then the strings would be significantly angled. If you moved the tailpiece over and then cut the string slots so that the strings passed over the bridge saddles in a straight line, then the string slots would be too close to the screw holes. If you then tried to make up for that by moving the screw holes, then the visual balance of the slots and holes on the tailpiece is way off. In my view, which is a few inches from the actual bass in question, the tailpiece is where it needs to be. I did notice one problem; the tailpiece had a fingerprint smudge, which I've now taken care of.
