Official Luthiers Forum!

For those who don't know, banduras have about 60 strings and it's a total pain in the arse to change them - on a good day, I can do it in as little as 2 hours but usually it takes about 3. Due to the extreme joy of string changing, I'd say I keep a set on for a good 2 to 3 years before I change them out.

I'm wondering if you guitar types can share your experiences with coated strings and if anyone knows of a source where I can find individual coated strings.

It's my understanding that coated strings don't sound as good as regular phosphor bronze but I imagine that they'll sound better than 1 year old dead strings.

Thanks,

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http://www.birkonium.com CNC Products for Luthiers
http://banduramaker.blogspot.com

Andy, in my opinion the D'Addario EXP coated strings are nothing short of amazing. 95% of the brilliance of new strings and they sound great for months, not days.

They are pricey, but in the end, worth it.

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"Building guitars looks hard, but it's actually much harder than it looks." Tom Buck

My experience with D'Addarios XP's has been excellent, and also with Elixir Nanoweb stings.
These coated stings to my ear do not seem to affect the sound by much initially, but extend string life at lot - well worth the extra money.
I believe the coating only applies to wound strings, and cleaning strings (even coated ones) after each playing can help a lot to extend string life.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

While we are the topic, what do people think of Ernie Ball coated strings? I just bought some (haven't put them on yet) but at $30.00 they were the most expensive strings I've ever bought.

Pat

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There are three kinds of people:

Those that make things happen,
those that watch things happen,
and those that wondered what happened.

I'm not a fan of Elixir strings in the slightest but I have never tried D'Addario or the newer Ernie Ball ones. I had Elixir strings on two of my guitars when I bought them and thought I had made a mistake.

I might give the D'Addario EXPs a go though.

I also hate string changing even 6 at a time so I got into Elixir Nanowebs, either Bronze or phosphor bronze. They are not as bright as uncoated the first couple hours but keep their sound for months instead of hours. Most internet string sources and I think Elderly sell Nanos as singles but they are not cheap. I always keep a stock of G strings as they break often with Elixirs, I use a few tunings that drop the G to F and F# and the trip back to G sometimes breaks the string.

Fred

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Fred Tellier
http://www.fetellierguitars.com
Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/FE-Tellier-Guitars/163451547003866

I use Elixirs for two reasons. First my chemistry seems to corrode strings fast. Second, I actually don't like the sound of new strings. They're just too bright and I like a slightly worn in feel. Elixirs aren't as bright and have that worn in sound right away, and keep that sound for a long time.

That's been my experience too. I have two "shop" guitars that get used a LOT... Everyone who comes over to play this time of year I tell to leave their ax at home so as to not expose it to the temp changes etc and just use one of my shop guitars. As such these things normally require a string change every couple of weeks. With the EXPs I am going 3 months now and they even look better longer too.

It would be great if we did another group buy on strings from D-Addario and this time include the EXPs.

I dont use anything but... love the EXPs but elixers are great too.
I would definitely be in for a group buy if theres a savings.

I like the EXP's. They definitely last way longer than uncoated, and don't feel any different to me.

I believe you can buy single strings and bulk strings from juststrings.com, but I don't know if that applies to the EXP's

Joe

Maybe I just had a bad experience. I tried one set of EXP's when they first came out. I'm a die-hard J17 fan that had migrated to playing Nanowebs and was excited about the EXP's. My experience - only set of new strings I've ever pulled off after just a few minutes. In fact, it's the only time in my life that I pulled a set of strings out the trash and put 'em back on - a set of Nanowebs that were a few months old. Seriously - and they actually sounded better. I'm willing to accept that maybe it was a bad batch of strings and maybe I should try again?

FWIW, there's a world of difference between Nanowebs and Polywebs in the Elixers. Nanos are one of my favorite strings. I've never used Polys since the Nanos came out.

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Wes McMillian
Santo, TX
http://www.wesmcmillian.com

Thanks guys. Juststrings.com does indeed have both the EXPs (Phosphor Bronze and 80/20) in a decent selection. They also have nanowebs but they're even more expensive.

What kind of sound do the 80/20's have ? Little less bright the the PB's?

I think what I'll do is buy a set of the EXP's for the diatonic string row and keep the chromatics (which get played much more infrequently) as the standard PBs.

It's going to be expensive though! Probably like $60 $70 grand total.

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http://www.birkonium.com CNC Products for Luthiers
http://banduramaker.blogspot.com

Wes, when I switched from Elixers to EXPs I did not notice any decrease in sound quality, though they are definitely a different "flavor".

For those who are not fans of Elixirs, make sure you try the nanowebs if all you tried initially was the polywebs. The polywebs would shred and end up looking like Budhist prayer flags (or laundery on a clothesline after a tornado )

There is no real comparison between the two and why Elixir keeps them (poly) on the market is beyond my understanding.

The other day I was playing on a new Taylor at a local shop. I knew there was something I liked about it (above the obvious). There was a sticker on the pickguard that read "Outfitted with Elixir Nanowebs"

Mike

I tried coated strings for the first time about 6 months ago. The same set has been on since then and I can't even remember what brand they were - I'll have to look. I noticed that they were not quite as bright as the phosphor bronze strings I was using but after a couple of days I couldn't tell the difference. My hands sweat a lot and if I am playing a lot regularly I can't expect to keep a set on for more than a few days on the outside. Six months on these strings is nothing short of a miracle to me.

When I play for an extended period of time (and sweat alot) it seems that the strings become dampened a little. Next time I pull the guitar out though, they are as bright as ever.