Which Strings?

guitarjack66 · April 2022

I am still deciding on which strings,both gauge and brand,for my Grand Auditorium sized guitar. It is fitted with 12 gauge,probably D'addario,but I find these too thick and heavy for my needs.

drofluf · April 2022

Try Newtone round core in the same gauge; it sounds counter intuitive but they are “lighter” as in easier to play than hex cored strings of the same gauge. Conventional wisdom is that if you go too light on an acoustic the strings won’t drive the soundboard and you’ll lose tone.

guitarjack66 · April 2022

I meant to add a bit more to my post but it was cut short by an Easter video call with my daughter and grandaughter.
I have a jumbo with 10 gauge and they are ok but probably a bit too light and I should have stuck with the previous 11s. Newtones are something I've seen but not tried yet.

Mellish · April 2022

I mainly use Martin MA140. They are hex core...... I. wouldn't go below 11s and, if 12s seem heavy to you, I'd avoid 13s.
But the best thing is to grab a bunch of different brands (PB, 80/20, monel, hex and round core, 11s and 12s) and see which you like

Gomers · April 2022

D'Addarios tend to be a bit rougher on the fingers IME, if your guitar is mahogany, I'd definitely try some Martin Retros (Monels), gauge for gauge they seem lighter and sound fabulous on hog guitars.

guitarjack66 · April 2022

Gomers said:

D'Addarios tend to be a bit rougher on the fingers IME, if your guitar is mahogany, I'd definitely try some Martin Retros (Monels), gauge for gauge they seem lighter and sound fabulous on hog guitars.

You know what,I barely focus on the woods guitars are made from. Whether this is right or wrong I simply don't know. I tend to just look for solid wood types,but again I simply don't know if that matters that much either.

guitarjack66 · April 2022

guitarjack66 said:

Gomers said:

D'Addarios tend to be a bit rougher on the fingers IME, if your guitar is mahogany, I'd definitely try some Martin Retros (Monels), gauge for gauge they seem lighter and sound fabulous on hog guitars.

You know what,I barely focus on the woods guitars are made from. Whether this is right or wrong I simply don't know. I tend to just look for solid wood types,but again I simply don't know if that matters that much either.

Just to add to this,maybe my lack of focus on specific woods is that like Tannin(it appears) I am concerned about the overuse of certain woods because they need to be the 'right' one. I'd rather woods readily available,and especially not over exploited,were used to make guitars relative to the part of the world that they are manufactured. Living in the UK,I'd readily play guitars made of our natural woods,provided they were replaced too.

bertie · April 2022

guitarjack66 said:

guitarjack66 said:

Gomers said:

D'Addarios tend to be a bit rougher on the fingers IME, if your guitar is mahogany, I'd definitely try some Martin Retros (Monels), gauge for gauge they seem lighter and sound fabulous on hog guitars.

You know what,I barely focus on the woods guitars are made from. Whether this is right or wrong I simply don't know. I tend to just look for solid wood types,but again I simply don't know if that matters that much either.

Just to add to this,maybe my lack of focus on specific woods is that like Tannin(it appears) I am concerned about the overuse of certain woods because they need to be the 'right' one. I'd rather woods readily available,and especially not over exploited,were used to make guitars relative to the part of the world that they are manufactured. Living in the UK,I'd readily play guitars made of our natural woods,provided they were replaced too.

different woods = different tone/response/sound

nearly all "tone wood" these days is sourced from "sustainable" resources - as taken from the CITES initiative It is illegal to fell and use "protected species" (such as Brazilian Rosewood). but existing stocks may exist.

Tonewoods readily available in this country tend to be for back/sides and include Cherry, Walnut, Sycamore - Im honestly not sure about soundboard woods, like Spruce and Cedar

back on the OP - try different strings, what may be "good" for "Fred/Bob/Norman or Nora" might not be for you - sometimes you dont find "your brand" for years..................... I dont know how long you've been playing, but personally Id "try" and persevere with 12s...... if only that it will help with future finger strength, and for me 11's do sound "thinner" on acoustics (and of course some will say they cant tell

) but its your hands and ears, and ultimately your call

BillDL · April 2022

Try tuning the guitar down a half step while strung with 12s to see how it feels and sounds.

guitarjack66 · April 2022

BillDL said:

Try tuning the guitar down a half step while strung with 12s to see how it feels and sounds.

Good idea. Not sure why I didn't think of this as I've done that with my jumbo in the past.

BillDL · April 2022

It's always been quite common for 12-string players to tune down a whole step to D and then capo at the 2nd to reduce the tension and stresses on the guitar, make it somewhat easier to play, and also to resolve intonation issues caused by the thick/thin string pairs, but a lot of 6-string acoustic and electric players also tune down a half step. Not all of them capo at the 1st fret. Listen to AC-DC's later renditions of Shook Me All Night Long and you'll hear that Angus and Malcolm have tuned down a half step so Brian can still screech it out roughly in key, but they are still playing open G and D forms (or fragments thereof). There's loads of examples of players that tune down half a step.

If you have a capo that doesn't obstruct your fretting hand much and if you can locate frets without relying on the fretboard position inlays, tuning down to D#/Eb and using a capo on the 1st fret might help and it also has the benefit of reducing the nut action if the slots aren't filed deeply enough and you get intonation problems with some strings in open chords. The reduced tension of only a half step down isn't usually enough to alter the neck relief significantly enough where you would notice or have to loosen the truss rod to compensate.

guitarjack66 · April 2022

BillDL said:

It's always been quite common for 12-string players to tune down a whole step to D and then capo at the 2nd to reduce the tension and stresses on the guitar, make it somewhat easier to play, and also to resolve intonation issues caused by the thick/thin string pairs, but a lot of 6-string acoustic and electric players also tune down a half step. Not all of them capo at the 1st fret. Listen to AC-DC's later renditions of Shook Me All Night Long and you'll hear that Angus has tuned down a half step so Brian can still screech it out roughly in key, but he's still playing open G and D forms (or fragments thereof). There's loads of examples of players that tune down half a step.

If you have a capo that doesn't obstruct your fretting hand much and if you can locate frets without relying on the fretboard position inlays, tuning down to D#/Eb and using a capo on the 1st fret might help and it also has the benefit of reducing the nut action if the slots aren't filed deeply enough and you get intonation problems with some strings in open chords. The reduced tension of only a half step down isn't usually enough to alter the neck relief significantly enough where you would notice or have to loosen the truss rod to compensate.

I play my jumbo capoed on the 2nd fret as the body is simply too big for my comfort but dont't change from standard too much. Although it is currently in double drop D as I was trying to get a similar sound to Neil Young's 'This Old Guitar.' He often tunes to at least a single drop D for some songs.

Tannin · April 2022

BillDL said:

The reduced tension of only a half step down isn't usually enough to alter the neck relief significantly enough where you would notice or have to loosen the truss rod to compensate.

Yep. Rough rule of thumb: 1 whole tone = 1 gauge, so far as feel goes. As an example, a while back I tuned a set of 12s up a whole tone to F# to approximate the feel of 13s on that guitar. Sure enough, when I put real 13s on and tuned to E, the feel was similar.

My go-to from what you've told us so far Jack would be a set of DR Sunbeams in 11 gauge. I have a set of round core PB Newtones at home (theoretically much the same thing) but haven't tried them out yet.

I've been slow to join the round core faith, but seem to be slowly swapping more of my guitars over to rounds - mostly Sunbeams and Pyramid Western Folk thus far but I have some others waiting their turn to try out.

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories

In this Discussion

Become a Subscriber!

Which Strings?

Comments