Roto 66 - - Undependable?

[HaphAsSard]

That’s why I stopped using them…. I thought they sounded great, but were inconsistent package to package.

It’s crazy to me that every time somebody posts something negative about a brand, people come to the brands rescue and swear that in decades they’ve used that brand exclusively and never had an issue .

Capitalistic loyalty to a brand that doesn’t endorse you or has ever given you an actual dime to defend them blows my mind.

And I have my favourite brands of strings, but I’m not gonna be delusional and say that I haven’t gotten a dud pack here and there…

Your argument can be easily flipped: once the rumour about their supposedly consistent unreliability was dispelled within the first ten posts, why did brand haters, or sometime-bitten-forever-vocal former users, come out in droves to point out how they in fact got duds in the past (with some having a sample of one under their belt) ?

Also, you're dismissing positive experiences as either delusional or disingenuous. Setting aside the coolness in that or lack thereof, why should one read yours and believe it, and not those?


Your general point about fanboys is one I absolutely agree with, mind you.
I do make a difference between those who recommend everything and anything their beloved brand produces (sometimes regardless of having actual experience with each and any of them);
or even those who think their favourite products are "God's gift to bassists" (in quotes, because reasons) and will never fail to work wonders for everyone indistinctly;
from people who simply, within the context of a discussion about one product which they happen to like and use regularly, just mention such preference, along with other details. The last category is not one of brand loyalists, but of product loyalists at most.

 

[ElectricBass72]

I've had bad experiences with Rotosound strings. When I first purchased my Rickenbacker 4003... it was a given in the bass community that Rotosounds MUST be the strings that go on the mighty Rick. Well.... they went dead very fast, like 3 days fast. Tried 3 different sets with same results. The Rick does much better with DR High beams, Dunlop Super Brights and D'Addario Pro Steel. I don't waste any more time or money with Rotosound.

 

[trothwell]

On the topic of excessive brand loyalty:

I indeed never have had a problem with Rotosound 66, nor with 77. And after using a variety of strings from various brands, these two are increasingly becoming my strings of choice. I often find that, after using something else, I put back on Rotosound and wonder why I ever left.

On the other hand, I have had defective strings from their 88 line, and am not sure if I would ever buy those again. I tend now to favor Labella or D'Addario for tape wound strings.

And the Rotosound 55s are, in my opinion, just weird. They sound good, but I don't find them any smoother feeling than the 66s, maybe a bit rougher even, which dilutes their value as "pressurewound" strings. Definitely prefer GHS there.

And I like a variety of other brands for particular tones. While I have had some defective strings from them, I think DR is great for the sound they get. I love a lot of GHS strings too, especially Super Steels and Brite Flats, though I'm not currently using either on anything.

But sure! If someone is asking if Rotosound 66 are as prone defects as legend says, why shouldn't I offer up my positive experience? It's anecdotal, but so is most of this stuff. It would indeed be interesting to see some real high-quantity data on likelihood of string defects by brand and string type, but I think in practice, for most people, gut feel from personal experience combined with anecdotes from others is as serious as this gets.

 

[Bass Ameg]

Yes, E string was dead out of the box.

 

[Timothy Brosnan]

If so, how come it wasn't present with the nickel rounds? The nut hasn't changed, nor has the neck relief. Different string alloy reacting with the pickup magnets differently? Maybe I'll try messing with the pickup heights, but so far... not so good. A brand new set of strings should not come out of a sealed plastic package looking like the E is rusting. Nope.

The Rotosound strings I’ve had issue with was the RS66M medium scale set. That .090 E string had a funky chorus type sound that I couldn’t get rid of, nor could I intonate it. Their long scale RS66LC set though, no problems.

 

[trothwell]

The Rotosound strings I’ve had issue with was the RS66M medium scale set. That .090 E string had a funky chorus type sound that I couldn’t get rid of, nor could I intonate it. Their long scale RS66LC set though, no problems.

Interesting, and good extra data!

All of my Rotosound experiences have been with long scale sets.

 

[ajkula66]

The Rotosound strings I’ve had issue with was the RS66M medium scale set. That .090 E string had a funky chorus type sound that I couldn’t get rid of, nor could I intonate it.

Roto short scale sets - both rounds and flats - are best left alone, IME. If they decided to offer a thicker gauge I'd probably be all over them. To me personally, neither the sound nor the feel of their SS strings matches the LS offerings.

I'd absolutely *love* to see a short scale version of the Billy Sheehan set...not going to happen, but one can dream...

In my much younger years I used to kill a set of Rotos/Superwounds in a single gig. But absolutely nothing sounds like a fresh set of 66s.

Now that I'm older and my body chemistry has changed, I'd love to re-visit Rotos, but I only play short scale basses these days so...no dice.

 

[GIBrat51]

.
These are the reports I was expecting to hear.

I mean how could a company stay in business selling crap strings for over 50 yrs

Especially if it's a company that sells strings that already have a reputation for eating frets. (That's not true anymore, right?)

Well...
Maybe yes... maybe no. I bought my '78 Fender P-Bass from it's original owner - a GI that I was stationed in the UK with, in the summer of 1988. He had a band that gigged - a lot - in the pubs and military clubs around us. He proudly told me "I never use anything but Roto 66's on it"; the empty package from the current set was in the bass's case. One of the things I noticed about the bass? Most of the frets, from the nut to the 12th one, were pretty much gone. When I went to sleep that night? Those strings were in the rubbish, and the bass was wearing a set of ROTO RS77LD Monel flats... Which it wore for several years - after I had it re-fretted...
As for the tales about Roto 66's eating Rickenbacker frets? Yeah, they probably did eat some. If they can eat Fender frets, they can certainly eat others. To be fair, though; I have no idea if my friend ever did any fret maintenance; part of the lack of frets may be his fault...
I own a '73 Rick 4001; it's small, thin, soft frets are fine. But, that's probably because as far as I can tell? It never wore any round wounds in it's life - until I got it. I put a set of Rick's discontinued Light Nickel Rounds on it, and played those for a while. It wears Dogal JC106A Jaco Carbonsteel flats, now; and has for a while. In fact, I'm pretty sure the nasty old flats I took off it, were the original light gauge Maxima Flats that it came from the factory with. I still kick myself for throwing them away...

 

[Wood and Wire]

I gotta say, with regards to any brand of bass strings :

A) Whenever there's been a chorusing sound, it's because the string got twisted when tuned up to pitch (remedied by taking the string off, laying it out flat, from bridge to machine head, and making sure no twist is introduced as it's brought up to pitch).

B) With a few exceptions, every time a string was diagnosed as being dead out of the packet, it transpired that whoever installed the string had cut it to length (coincidence? Hard to say, but it makes it difficult to assess if the string truly were dead out of the packet, or if the act of cutting the string caused the core to slip, and killed the string).

 

[Timothy Brosnan]

Roto short scale sets - both rounds and flats - are best left alone, IME. If they decided to offer a thicker gauge I'd probably be all over them. To me personally, neither the sound nor the feel of their SS strings matches the LS offerings.

I'd absolutely *love* to see a short scale version of the Billy Sheehan set...not going to happen, but one can dream...

In my much younger years I used to kill a set of Rotos/Superwounds in a single gig. But absolutely nothing sounds like a fresh set of 66s.

Now that I'm older and my body chemistry has changed, I'd love to re-visit Rotos, but I only play short scale basses these days so...no dice.

In my experience, Ken Smith medium scale stainless rounds are fantastic!

 

[Pier_]

I stumbled across a comment (off TB) that said Rotos were a crapshoot. You may, or may not, get dead strings right out of the package. I researched it further and found more comments that seem to agree with that.

the "dead strings problem" was during a specific period (now I can't remember the years) some time ago, when they started switching to "coloured ball" and changed the package from paper to foil.
in that period I dismissed my long time relationship with Rotosound and switched to other brands.

when they changed the package design the second time, the problem disappeared. I mostly use Rotosound (RS66LD, BS66 and RS77LD), and in the last years (since 2020 for sure, probably even 2019) I've changed so many sets on my basses, and never ever had issues.

as for the years before the first change (balls and foil).

 

[Timothy Brosnan]

Billy Sheehan talked about this before. In the late 80’s, he had switched from Rotosounds, to Snarling Dogs, because he kept getting bad strings. Apparently, the founder of Rotosound died, and at the same time, they got shipments of bad wire. Eventually, things got straightened out, and they seem to be ok ever since.

I think Rotosound should rethink the gauges on their short, and medium scale rounds, because those .090 E strings (round and flatwound) just don’t work. The full scale sets are just fine.

 

[ajkula66]

In my experience, Ken Smith medium scale stainless rounds are fantastic!

I've tried their short scale set and these are very good strings indeed. Different from what I was looking for at the time, though so I moved on.

 

[BrentSimons]

Do those strings go by any other name? I can't find any that say "NY" on the package here . . unless I'm just missing it

https://www.sweetwater.com/c586--4_...GVlbCJdLCJTZXJpZXMiOlsiRCdBZGRhcmlvIFhMIl19fQ

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/de...-long-scale-nickel-wound-bass-strings-045-105

 

[thrashingbass]

Old thread, but "worth" reviving to note that I haven't had any issues with long scale Rotosound sets all these years: these include BS66, funkmaster, and SB66LB. My Rotobass 35 set was also perfect, and contrary to popular opinion, I love them on the bass I tried them on, and plan to keep using them.

However, the short scale Swing Bass 66 I tried a few years back was a big problem, with a chorusy and impossible to intonate E-they almost were like an altogether different string set and company! Modern packaging, so it wasn't NOS. Super unfortunate, as I was hoping to use them with shorties as I absolutely love them on my long scale basses.

RS88 short scale tapewound strings have been mostly a success, especially so the second set I tried, which now are made differently by the ball ends (i.e. now they are easy to intonate.)

The RS77 for shorties were just OK-long scale 77s are better, IMHO and IME.

It is widely acknowledged that they used to have problems decades ago, but the usual well-known players that used them back in the day, stopped, but went back to using them still do nowadays. This doesn't mean duds won't happen, but that their production is rather solid, and has been great in my experience (barring the aforementioned short scale set.) No need to feel as if they aren't a quality string, even if some just do not enjoy them.

 

[DJ Bebop]

I have also used Rotosound Swing Bass 66s since the early 70s and have never had a problem with them!

 

[Timothy Brosnan]

Old thread, but "worth" reviving to note that I haven't had any issues with long scale Rotosound sets all these years: these include BS66, funkmaster, and SB66LB. My Rotobass 35 set was also perfect, and contrary to popular opinion, I love them on the bass I tried them on, and plan to keep using them.

However, the short scale Swing Bass 66 I tried a few years back was a big problem, with a chorusy and impossible to intonate E-they almost were like an altogether different string set and company! Modern packaging, so it wasn't NOS. Super unfortunate, as I was hoping to use them with shorties as I absolutely love them on my long scale basses.

RS88 short scale tapewound strings have been mostly a success, especially so the second set I tried, which now are made differently by the ball ends (i.e. now they are easy to intonate.)

The RS77 for shorties were just OK-long scale 77s are better, IMHO and IME.

It is widely acknowledged that they used to have problems decades ago, but the usual well-known players that used them back in the day, stopped, but went back to using them still do nowadays. This doesn't mean duds won't happen, but that their production is rather solid, and has been great in my experience (barring the aforementioned short scale set.) No need to feel as if they aren't a quality string, even if some just do not enjoy them.

I felt the same way with the medium scale RS66M’s-like they were manufactured by someone else, out of a different material than the RS66LC’s I put on my long scale basses. Those were completely fine. It was really too bad, because I really wanted to like them. When I reached out to Rotosound, they didn’t want to hear about it.

Well, fortunately there are other brands to use.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

The range of opinions presented, from “they’re great” to “they suck” is illustrative of a QC problem. I can only go by my own experience: corroded right out of the sealed package, wonky E string, and dead in three weeks. I won’t buy them again. This gibes closely with my experience buying them 40 years ago, apparently not much has changed. If you get a good set, they have that “piano bass” brightness, but it never lasts long. If you can afford a new set every gig or two, might be your string.

 

[Timothy Brosnan]

The range of opinions presented, from “they’re great” to “they suck” is illustrative of a QC problem. I can only go by my own experience: corroded right out of the sealed package, wonky E string, and dead in three weeks. I won’t buy them again. This gibes closely with my experience buying them 40 years ago, apparently not much has changed. If you get a good set, they have that “piano bass” brightness, but it never lasts long. If you can afford a new set every gig or two, might be your string.

What do you use as an alternative? I liked Ernie Ball stainless slinky’s, D’addario Pro Steels, Ken Smith Master series, and DR Highbeams.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

I've been using DAddario EXL 220 Nickel Rounds. They start out nearly as bright as Rotos, but stay that way longer, and are much less abrasive on fingers and frets