hard material to withstand string friction?

What are you trying to do with it that it needs 'lubricating' properties?

 

If you're talking making nuts out of them, you can make all of them equally slippery by putting some graphite powder in the slots when you change strings or every 6 months, whichever comes first, so it really doesn't matter.

 

Well, I would go with the choice that keeps you out of prison.

 

Have you considered a zerofret? No friction at all.

 

While this is perfectly true, to answer your question - the Tusq nut will be the slipperiest. I think you can even get a "self lubricating" one, in fact. The main thing to be concerned about with any nut, is not having the slots so narrow that they bind the strings up.

 

Ivory is very illegal.

AFAIK the only sources are from 'estate" ivory and that will vary from state to state in the US. No clue what the situation is in Germany.

Regardless, probably not what you are looking for anyway.

 

Walrus ivory is still legal to trade with some restrictions, so is whale ivory. Your problem comes when the instrument is seized and you have to prove it isn't elephant ivory. Stay away from ivory.

 

besides, having installed a few (provided) ivory nuts and saddles, it's no better than bone anyway, in fact it's slightly softer.

i'll not be messing with it again.

 

uh, what?

the requirements may not be remotely the same! you should clue us in as to exactly the plan here, you'll get more useful answers.

 

Unless you're using a tremolo, a long, long, time. Even using a tremolo a long time (like decades.)

 

no, because you're not telling us what this purpose actually is.

in the nuts, it takes a while, especially if the string angle is fairly shallow. it still wears away faster than bone.

in saddles, pretty much right away.

that's my complaint against the graphite/tusq kind of stuff; the material may be self-lubricating, but it's soft enough for string windings to create ridges in the slots.

 

If expense is not an issue take a look at some of the different glass compounds available. Glass generally is harder than steel so wear would be concentrated on the strings rather than the saddles. I don't know if it will have the required strength though.

 

so you're looking to have saddles you can swivel in to get that what my clueless western ear calls the "sitar sound"?

i'd think that hard white nylon material would do OK, since the critical magic buzz is happening over a wider flat area where the string by definition isn't putting much pressure on the saddle material.

would metal sound too harsh for this application?

 

Something along the lines of palladium glass (a glass that contains palladium.)