Strings that are round wound from the bridge and graduate to flat toawrds the neck. Awesome idea or am I crazy?
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Round to Flat wound.
- Thread starter googs1971
- Start date
Interesting idea but it wouldn't work. The string has to be consistent over its entire length in order for the harmonic series to work out right. The mass and stiffness couldn't change as you transitioned from rounds to flats. I don't see how they could do that.
What do yo see as the benefit of this?
What do yo see as the benefit of this?
WRONG!
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BASS STRINGS
FretMaster Bass
The String
Round over the pickups for that bright sound but burnished ever so slightly over the fretboard. Round Wound soundFlat Wound feel. A great electric string for bass playing. Fretmaster gives you all the tone but none of the fretwear.
The Experience
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Those DMs seem to be more of a groudround/roundwound combination. To do as the OP suggests would take a wrapping layer that went from flat to tound during its length. I imagine the manufacturing complexity would be huge, both in manufacturing the wrap wire and in wrapping the core. I'm not really sure what the benefit would be even if it were possible.
Great graphic, but I'm right -- EPICALLY right, even.
You couldn't radically change a string's construction over its length and have it sound right or intonate right. Imagine hitting the 12th fret harmonic. Half of the string would basically be flat and the other side basically round. What are the odds that they'd vibrate symmetrically? I'd say about zilch.
Maybe you can get away with grinding part of a roundwound string flat, but that's nowhere near as radical as what we're talking about.
Also, the Dean Markley people are either blowing smoke or very confused when they say a string's tone only comes from the part that's over the pickup. The harmonics and overtones that define your tone are created by the entire string.
I just found this description of the FretMaster strings online:
"""Dean Markley has been a leading name in the guitar string industry for years and their strings just keep getting better and better. Their Fretmaster series strings are made with a burnishing process that compresses the wrap over the fretboard, leaving the string mass intact. The round winding of these strings produces a rich and beautiful tone. Fretmaster strings are high quality strings that you can trust!"""
So they compress them flat rather than grinding them flat -- that explains how they got around the string mass problem.
"""Dean Markley has been a leading name in the guitar string industry for years and their strings just keep getting better and better. Their Fretmaster series strings are made with a burnishing process that compresses the wrap over the fretboard, leaving the string mass intact. The round winding of these strings produces a rich and beautiful tone. Fretmaster strings are high quality strings that you can trust!"""
So they compress them flat rather than grinding them flat -- that explains how they got around the string mass problem.
seems a lot like having your cake and eating too. although on tb at least the standard comment about flats (by rounds people) is that they love the feel but hate the dull sound. so a best of both worlds string like what is proposed would certainly seem to have a market.
Great graphic, but I'm right -- EPICALLY right, even.
You couldn't radically change a string's construction over its length and have it sound right or intonate right. Imagine hitting the 12th fret harmonic. Half of the string would basically be flat and the other side basically round. What are the odds that they'd vibrate symmetrically? I'd say about zilch.
Maybe you can get away with grinding part of a roundwound string flat, but that's nowhere near as radical as what we're talking about.
Also, the Dean Markley people are either blowing smoke or very confused when they say a string's tone only comes from the part that's over the pickup. The harmonics and overtones that define your tone are created by the entire string.
No your still wrong sorry,
No your still wrong sorry,
Aw, shucks. I thought I was right for a second there..
Yeah, the Markley ones were (are?) a modified roundwound. A true flatwound string uses flat outer wrap wire, like a ribbon. A true roundwound uses a round outer wrap, like a wire. While it's POSSIBLE that someone could come up with a way to change the metal from a flat ribbon to a round wire, and then figure out a way to have that happen at exactly the right part of the winding process, I'd bet it'd be horribly expensive, making Thomastic Spirocore for a double bass look cheap in comparison. BTW, the Markley FretMasters didn't really work that well. I got a couple of sets in the store I used to manage (1977-1988) and used one set on my StingRay and put a set on one of the store's Precisions. Bottom line was that they sounded like Dean Markely Ground Wound Rounds.
So, what do you want from the string? If you like the roundwound sound but not the feel of them, go with some of the the different versions of modified rounds. Now these fall into two distinct groups. There's the ground ones (D'Addario Half-Rounds and GHS Brite-Flats) where the outer wrap is ground down, removing metal, to almost a flat outer surface. The other group is like GHS Progressives, Ken Smith's polished rounds, the old Sterlingworth Slicks, etc. where the outer wrap is compressed to smooth it out so they're not as abrasive as regular rounds.
But anything you do to the wrap affects the sound, and if you want the "boing" of a roundwound string, learn to deal with it. I use rounds on my fretless basses without worry. The SOUND is paramount.
John
So, what do you want from the string? If you like the roundwound sound but not the feel of them, go with some of the the different versions of modified rounds. Now these fall into two distinct groups. There's the ground ones (D'Addario Half-Rounds and GHS Brite-Flats) where the outer wrap is ground down, removing metal, to almost a flat outer surface. The other group is like GHS Progressives, Ken Smith's polished rounds, the old Sterlingworth Slicks, etc. where the outer wrap is compressed to smooth it out so they're not as abrasive as regular rounds.
But anything you do to the wrap affects the sound, and if you want the "boing" of a roundwound string, learn to deal with it. I use rounds on my fretless basses without worry. The SOUND is paramount.
John
This was addressed years ago by D'Addario with their "half -round" strings. I've used them for years. They give good round wound response, feel like flats, sound great, and don't go dead in three months like the Fender flats I was using before that. I sometimes go a year or two without changing strings, and even then don't hear the difference much. Give them a try.
rotosound flats sound like rounds, and the brightness lasts a good 2-3 months atleast for me... I cant wait for these things to mellow out and its been about 2 months now...(just put a set on my lp bass.)
