I've aquired a nice mid40s Kay Swingmaster. It has strings I've never seen before: black by the tailpiece, with green, blue, yellow, and red thread bottom to top in the pegbox. The most unusual feature for me is that the strings at the tailpiece end have little brass rods that the string ends are looped around. Anybody have any info? Thanks in advance.
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Double Bass String ID
- Thread starter Bruce Calin
- Start date
Hey Bruce, congrats on the SwingMaster!!!
You know the string drill, since there are a lot of subtle color differences, a pic at the tailpiece and at the pegbox would be nice. Plus we all want to see your new Kay
.
Did Santa bring this early???
You know the string drill, since there are a lot of subtle color differences, a pic at the tailpiece and at the pegbox would be nice. Plus we all want to see your new Kay
.Did Santa bring this early???
Hi, Don,Hey Bruce, congrats on the SwingMaster!!!
You know the string drill, since there are a lot of subtle color differences, a pic at the tailpiece and at the pegbox would be nice. Plus we all want to see your new Kay
Did Santa bring this early???
I've had it for a couple of months.The previous owner is a former student. I'm so cyber challenged that I'm hoping my grandson will help me get photos up when he's here for the holidays. It's in pretty decent shape but needs some setup work-one of the reasons I'm curious about the strings. I doubt I'll keep it since it wouldn't be practical for most of the playing I do, but it's fun to play and should be used.
I think they are (UK) Innovation Braided.
They have the brass bar and the E is green and the G is red n the pegbox, cannot remember the A and D colors for sure, but they might fit too.
The black tailpiece silk was requested by some British arco players which didn’t like the blue-yellow-blue on a bass playing classical stuff, I was told.
They have the brass bar and the E is green and the G is red n the pegbox, cannot remember the A and D colors for sure, but they might fit too.
The black tailpiece silk was requested by some British arco players which didn’t like the blue-yellow-blue on a bass playing classical stuff, I was told.
Surely the pegbox colours fit Innovations. Are the strings whiteish silver nylonwound? If so, they are Innovation Super silvers. The oldest UK ones have the brass rods and black tailpiece ends. If they look more standard steelwound strings Innovation Braided should fit the picture.
I think you're correct. I have a different set of Innovations that have the colors on the tailpiece end but are similar. Mine are the Polychromes. They weren't very well finished and didn't work very well for me, so I didn't use them for very long. I believe you're right about the Super Silvers. They do have that finish. Would these be considered a good string for this bass? I'd like to get a better setup before I decide. At this point I'm not sure. It would be fun to put a set of guts on it but I'm not planning on keeping it so I probably won't. I appreciate the info.
I `ve had Super Silvers with Spiro weich E for couple of years on my jazz bass. I like them very much! Relaxed feel and tension, very gutlike timbre but with nice amount of sustain. Fortunately they also seem to be very durable because I can´t find the old UK sets anymore anywhere. From the newer GHS version I can only use the G. The others have too loose tension for my bass.
