Recommend strings for my fretless?

[Ron Johnson]

I just finished fixing up my old Epiphone accu bass. The previous owner removed the frets, and instead of re-fretting it I decided to put wood filler in the lines and sand it. Anyways, I need the perfect set of strings now.

I measured from the nut to the saddle and it was about 35", although it is through-body, so i marked where the string touches the nut and then pulled it out, and it was 36". This confuses me because it seems like a regular full scale 34" bass, and the fact that its an old 4 string doesn't suggest it would be any longer scale. Did I measure wrong?

Since its fretless, that obviously means the action is low. I like it low with no buzzing. So would that mean I want higher guage?
Also if this helps, i have a p style pickup near the neck and a jbar near the bridge with passive electronics, and I'm in a rock band.
Also, what are those strings with the red nylon wrap at the end and should I have them?

So the questions are guage, flatwound or groundwound, nickel, steel, or copper, etc.

What strings do you recommend to perfectly suit this bass? And where is the cheapest I can get them? Thank you

 

[Linnin]

If you want Growl and plenty of Mmmwah you need roundwounds. GHS Boomers or D'Addario EXL-170BT's Sweetwater has good prices and free shipping. You can find slightly lower prices but add in the shipping and they end up costing more.

If you want percussive attack and smoothness, then flatwounds are for you. I like GHS Precision flats best with Fender flats a close second. There must be a thousand threads on flats, so happy reading.

 

[Ron Johnson]

Are groundwounds good? From what I understand they're in between flat and round. I need something like flatwound for my fretless

 

[Sean Riddle]

Try tapewounds.

 

[Ron Johnson]

Update, I've been checking out halfrounds/groundwounds since I want something smooth feeling, but not completely mellow. Do you guys think I will be satsified with D'addario halfrounds, Dean Markley NPS round core, or GHS brite flats? Which brand? And strings look expensive, so I want to make sure what I chose will work well for rock. I play with fingers by the way.

 

[raventepes]

I'm go with GHS Pressure Wound's. Bright, a tad on the mellow side, but has a really nice attack. They're somewhere between flats and rounds. A perfect string, in my opinion.

 

[Ron Johnson]

Actually I just read some really bad reviews on halfrounds. So flatwounds it is. What brand?

 

[west al]

Check out D'Addario ETB92 Nylon Tapewounds.

 

[Ron Johnson]

Looks like D'addario chromes may work? Any word about them before i go out and drop 25 bucks on them?

 

[jorno]

Labella Deep Tones. Trust me.

 

[deeptubes]

What kind of tone are you looking for? Brighter? Fender tapes. Warm? Chromes. Super thumpy and mellow? D'Addario tapes.

Open an account on bassstringsonline.com. Shoot them a message, tell them you are on Talkbass, and give your TB username. You will get preferred pricing.

 

[Jaco who?]

Looks like D'addario chromes may work? Any word about them before i go out and drop 25 bucks on them?

I love the way chromes sound, but they're really stiff, at least with my 55 yr old fretting hand. If I bought them again, I'd opt for the ECB80 set. I think they're 40 60 75 95 but I'm a little fuzzy about the A and the D.

The red silks might have been TI flats that everyone raves about. You need to be careful with those. They sound fantastic on my esp bass, bloody horrible awfull on my MIM fretless jazz, and they're not cheap.

 

[Ron Johnson]

I love the way chromes sound, but they're really stiff,

What do you mean by stiff? Hard to bend? Hard to fret? And did you have heavy, medium, or light guage chromes that felt stiff? I'm considering medium.

 

[Sean Riddle]

Flats are very hard to bend and they can be really stiff. You don't need to bend at all when playing fretless. You have the beauty of true vibrato at your fingertips and it is truly a beautiful sound.

 

[Jaco who?]

By stiff I mean hard to fret, and they were the ECB81 set, 45-65-80-100 (considered the light gauge). I personally wouldn't even think about medium gauges, you might like them though.

 

[Ron Johnson]

By stiff I mean hard to fret, and they were the ECB81 set, 45-65-80-100 (considered the light gauge). I personally wouldn't even think about medium gauges, you might like them though.

Well I suppose I don't have to worry about difficult fretting on a fretless, haha.
And perhaps the lights were difficult for you to fret because there is less string to grip and press down.

 

[Jaco who?]

Well I suppose I don't have to worry about difficult fretting on a fretless, haha.
And perhaps the lights were difficult for you to fret because there is less string to grip and press down.

No, they're too damn stiff for me.

 

[Sean Riddle]

Well I suppose I don't have to worry about difficult fretting on a fretless, haha.
And perhaps the lights were difficult for you to fret because there is less string to grip and press down.

What kind of tension are you normally used to? If you want a really low tension flat, the Thomastiks are highly recommend by people here. Also, LaBella recently released a light flatwound set. I don't know how they've been received though. Also, do maybe consider tapewounds. For a while I had a set of LaBella's white tapes on my fretless jazz and absolutely loved them, but I eventually didn't like the low tension (as I primarily play the Double Bass) so I switched to their Jamerson flats which I've really been loving.

 

[radioface]

GHS Brite Flats.

 

[MIMike]

What kind of sound do you want from the bass? You never really answered that question. I use D'Addario XLs on my fretless (Jazz). I like the round wound sound on fretless and the XLs (nickel) aren't too hard on the fretboard.
If you do go for ground wounds, I would highly reccommend cleaning them well before you put them on the bass. I tried them one and hated the dusty residue that seemed to be on them (I didn't clean before stringing).
If you want flats with a brighter tone, chromes start out kind of bright, but my RS 77s (they have a red silk wrap BTW) have stayed brighter than any other flats I've had. Those are currently on a fretted J. TI flats are very nice, but very expensive. I have found my favorite flat to date to be GHS Precision flats...long life, nice sound, nice feel and very consistent. I have a set of those on, what else, a Precision.