Anyone ever found one of these for nylon strings? I'm messing around with ukes and alternate tunings and want to know how far I can push the strings and different lengths.
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Diane,
my own experience with uke strings suggests that you can tune up or down a couple of notes beyond the designed for note. I regularly use aquila soprano strings for "C" tuning and tune them up to "D". Similarly, other people use concert gage strings (slightly thicker) and tune them to "C" tuning on a soprano to get a little more tension.
While experimenting, I think your biggest issue will be stretching, as once a nylon string is tuned up to a certain tension and has stretched out, if you return it to a lower tension, it doesn't hold that tuning very well and is a bit more floppy than it would if you had only ever tuned it to the lower note.
I think a starting place for gage tension would be to enter a known set at standard tuning (GCEA) and see what tensions come out. Good luck!
Replies
Gauges .025", .032", .036", and .028".
my own experience with uke strings suggests that you can tune up or down a couple of notes beyond the designed for note. I regularly use aquila soprano strings for "C" tuning and tune them up to "D". Similarly, other people use concert gage strings (slightly thicker) and tune them to "C" tuning on a soprano to get a little more tension.
While experimenting, I think your biggest issue will be stretching, as once a nylon string is tuned up to a certain tension and has stretched out, if you return it to a lower tension, it doesn't hold that tuning very well and is a bit more floppy than it would if you had only ever tuned it to the lower note.
I think a starting place for gage tension would be to enter a known set at standard tuning (GCEA) and see what tensions come out. Good luck!
It will tell me the tension I need to get a particular note, but how can I know if the string will allow that tension load?
http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/wikla/mus/NewScalc/
ciao