If I install a string set (that was previously on another bass) and don't have at least 3 wraps for the post, to take the tension strain off the angle going into the slot, I use a 'one over, the rest under' locking wrap, similar to what you described. Haven't yet had a problem with it: round-cores, tapes or flats.
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Stringing, Tuning, Intonation and Witnesses
- Thread starter Turnaround
- Start date
If I install a string set (that was previously on another bass) and don't have at least 3 wraps for the post, to take the tension strain off the angle going into the slot, I use a 'one over, the rest under' locking wrap, similar to what you described. Haven't yet had a problem with it: round-cores, tapes or flats.
A technique I have uses on both basses and guitars for years to make them stay in tune way, way better is this: After putting the strings on, I bring them to pitch, then I take a miniature set of channel-locks and as I pluck the string, I gently tighten the coil on the tuner. I pluck the string so I can actually hear the note change lower. I have always felt that a lot of tuning issues are just loose coils on the tuner. I realize some people might find issue with my method, but I have been using it for more years than I can remember. The tuning on my instruments are always the most stable whenever I play with others.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but steel doesn't stretch. As you tighten new strings, they get tighter and go up in pitch as a result. If they drop a little in tuning afterwards, I'm pretty sure that's just the neck wood adjusting to the difference in tension compared to the previous strings. The new string isn't "stretching out" to some new stability the steel hadn't settled to yet... right?
EDIT: Of course they can also go down a little due to the string fully bending to the new shape, meaning over the saddle / witness point, around the tuning peg and over the nut, etc. I still don't think the steel itself is stretching though.
EDIT: Of course they can also go down a little due to the string fully bending to the new shape, meaning over the saddle / witness point, around the tuning peg and over the nut, etc. I still don't think the steel itself is stretching though.
Steel most certainly DOES stretch.
If you heat it, sure - but otherwise? At room temperature just because the bass is exerting around 30 lbs on it??
If steel didn't stretch, how could you wrap stings around the posts? How could you have wound strings? Or car fenders?
OK I see where you're coming from, but ductility and malleability are different from elasticity... sorry to derail if this isn't quite on-topic, but I'm still scratching my head on this one.
EDIT: Maybe ductility is elasticity, it's been a long time!
Ductility is definitely not elasticity, look up Youngs Modulus of Elasticity.
Ductility is when it stays in the shape it is bent/pulled/squashed into, elasticity is when it returns to it's original shape when the force is removed.
Great - thanks for that. So with that in mind would you say bass strings stretch? Steel is ductile but I don't believe it's elastic... which I take to mean if they do stretch they'd only do so a little (otherwise they wouldn't change pitch), and then break if any more force was applied? "Squashed into" would be malleability.
Steel is elastic. How do you think steel springs work? How do the strings on your bass vibrate?
Strings will lose their tuning for a variety of reasons:
- Strings and truss-rod expand or contract due to changes in temperature. (And there's no such thing "room temperature" - just "temperature" and it's different from room to room, or even within the same room at different times or in different areas of it)
- The same for the neck and body woods - only less.
- Metals are also malleable so will slowly change shape due to the tension.
- You knock the tuners
- etc etc.
If steel didn't stretch, strings would either break or stay straight when trying to do bends. A bend makes it go up in pitch because there is more tension on it due to stretching it to a longer length, then it springs back to original tune.
Ok I'm with you all, I just had a mental block of an assumption that if it stretched, it wouldn't go up in pitch or return to where it started - my line of thinking was that it was the lack of stretching that allowed to do these things... in other words if it stretched, you'd do a bend and it would just remain loose and floppy after lol
I did see a relevant post here that seemed go unregarded. It was about "setting" the strings. When you first install a string and wind it up with the tuner, it may not settle in on the tuner and itself completely. The light stretching exerts extra tension which will help pull the string around the tuner and it will settle in better.
think of the strings like springs; the right kind of steel very much does stretch, and then snaps back to its original state with its molecules unchanged, up to a point. if you stretch or bend it past that point, then it deforms and stays stretched or bent.
so yeah, "stretching" your strings is a misnomer, because either the metal stays within its limits and goes right back to the way it was or it gets pulled past that limit and stays deformed.
on all strings i vote for plenty of length, enough to wind all the way down to the very bottom of the post; that reduces the twisting torque the string puts on the peghead itself.
Try not to go right to the bottom of the post. You want at least some room. You want some room so that it doesn't either creep up on itself or push the other winds on the post upwards.
On my Fenders, I measure out just a bit past the D string peg when installing the E string, out just past the G string peg for the A string, and just past the tip of the headstock for the D string. The G string doesn't get cut. Those are for the two basses with vintage tuners. I have an MIM standard Jazz that has the original tuning pegs so I cut a touch shorter because they taper.
This is how I usually do it, but I noticed that the E string break angle is much bigger than for the A string.
Hmm... maybe a little extra torque from a low tension E string is not a big problem?
it's actually the opposite problem, the A in particular has too little angle, you have to wind it all the way down or the string jumps around in the slot.
the E angle is usually fine.
