Piccollo Bass String Question

[jakepaul1]

I'm a guitarist who's thinking about getting a short scale SX and making it a piccolo bass (MarloweDK's YT videos conviced me!). Anyway, I've searched the forums and couldn't find a specific answer to a question I had; my question is: If I use the D'Addario Piccolo strings, will they work on short scale? The way it reads, they're for long/regular. I figure they'll work, but thought I'd put out a feeler.

Thanks in advance,

Jason

P.S. These are the strings that I am speaking about:
http://www.daddario.com/DADProdDetai...D=3&Class=ACBA

[lug]

Originally Posted by jakepaul1

I'm a guitarist who's thinking about getting a short scale SX and making it a piccolo bass (MarloweDK's YT videos conviced me!). Anyway, I've searched the forums and couldn't find a specific answer to a question I had; my question is: If I use the D'Addario Piccolo strings, will they work on short scale? The way it reads, they're for long/regular. I figure they'll work, but thought I'd put out a feeler.

Thanks in advance,

Jason

P.S. These are the strings that I am speaking about:
http://www.daddario.com/DADProdDetai...D=3&Class=ACBA

I don't see any reason why they wouldn't, but to be honest I just use the 4 lowest strings off a guitar set. They are typically long enough for a 30" scale bass (EBO in my case) and you have a lot of choice in guages and much much cheaper. The only reason to use them is because they will fit a long scale bass.

[jakepaul1]

Cool, I didn't think of trying that. Thanks for the advice!

Originally Posted by lug

I don't see any reason why they wouldn't, but to be honest I just use the 4 lowest strings off a guitar set. They are typically long enough for a 30" scale bass (EBO in my case) and you have a lot of choice in guages and much much cheaper. The only reason to use them is because they will fit a long scale bass.

[amper]

I've used D'Addario Chromes guitar strings on my Warwick 30". They fit perfectly. I've also used the top four strings from a six string 34" scale set and tuned up a bit, and while the wraps separated a bit on the low string around the tuning post, they held together just fine. That wasn't really "piccolo" per se, but B1-E2-A2-D3 or C2-F2-Bb2-Eb3. I like to call this "contralto" tuning.

With the Chromes guitar strings, I was trying to go C2-G2-D3-A3 (cello tuning, in fifths) with .065 (the heaviest string in the line), .045, .030, .020 (the lightest wound string in Chromes guitar strings). The .020 kept breaking around G#3, so I gave up, and went with D'Addario Prelude 4/4 cello strings.

Still, for piccolo bass (E2-A2-D3-G3), that .020 might work well, so you might want to investigate putting together a custom gauge set in that line. Most 34" scale "piccolo" sets you see out there use a plain G string rather than a wound, but I don't like plain strings on bass.

BTW, this is all for flats. If you want rounds, you can find .018 wound rounds in guitar strings.

[lug]

Originally Posted by jakepaul1

Cool, I didn't think of trying that. Thanks for the advice!

No problem. This has almost completely retired my guitar.