Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Richey Kay on February 27, 2015 at 11:24am

I would recommend standard nylon guitar strings for this Mike. I don't think the slightly shorter scale length would be a problem. In terms of what to tune it to, just use whatever sounds right. GDG should be fine though. Good luck! I actually made a small dulcimer style instrument for my daughter too, but I used a 13" scale and uke strings.

Permalink Reply by Mike on February 27, 2015 at 11:47am

Richey,

Thank you for the reply. If I use those strings, how do I know which 3 to use? I am very new to all of this.

Thanks,
Mike

Permalink Reply by Mike on February 27, 2015 at 11:51am

Also I just looked and I see there are medium, light, etc. which would be best to use?

Thanks again!
Mike

Permalink Reply by Sean Laffey on February 27, 2015 at 11:55am

Hi Mike

Look at tenor banjo strings, or octave mandola. Traditioabnl mountain tuning is usually DAd.. so use D A and e  from a pack of Irish tenor banjo strings, if you use Jazz tenor set, they are a fifth below .ie  CGDA, so that would give you GDg, but they might not be bright enough. Look on my page here for a picture of a dulcimer I built from plywood. The scale length was copied form an octave mandola. I''d go for longer rather than shorter scale as the stings become less string like and more like rods on short scale instruments, and the dulcimer needs half the length of the neck to get good sounding scales out of it.  Sean Laffey

Permalink Reply by Sean Laffey on February 27, 2015 at 12:06pm

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/photo/dulcimer-8-1?xg_source=activity

Permalink Reply by Richey Kay on February 27, 2015 at 12:11pm

All true and good. However Mike merely mentioned that he was using dulcimer (diatonic) fretting and a by no means unusually shirt scale length... the fact that he is making it for his 7 year old daughter leads me to thinking softer nylon strings would be ideal. Just use whichever 3 you like from a standard set, and don't overthink it! Have fun :-)

Permalink Reply by Rooster Reaves on February 27, 2015 at 12:20pm

I like to use Banjo strings there lite and they sound good.

Permalink Reply by The Phrygian Kid on February 27, 2015 at 12:25pm

You can do it with fishing line, I've used 20lb, 30lb & 40lb works great. That got me to key of g at around 520mm scale length

Plastic strings are gentler on youngsters hands and require less strength to fret cleanly, in my opinion they're much better for children than steel strings. Also sometimes less volume is a blessing ;)

Ps it's the same tuning/intervals as regular 3 string cbg tuning that everyone does here, so any strings that work for that.....

Permalink Reply by Joe Caruso on March 1, 2015 at 3:54am

Fishing line - brilliant !

Permalink Reply by Mike on February 27, 2015 at 2:37pm

Thanks everybody. I appreciate the advice and different options presented.

Kid, for the fishing line, does it stretch easily and need to be retuned very often? I was planning this summer making CBGs with my nieces and nephews when we all go to vacation together and that would make it a more economical option for me.

Thx!
Mike

Permalink Reply by The Phrygian Kid on February 27, 2015 at 2:58pm

At first, yes. For maybe a week or so. Same as classic strings

Permalink Reply by Mike on February 27, 2015 at 5:56pm

Thank you!