String question

[Berkleo]

I'm attempting to restring a new (new to me) guitar for the first time and have a dilemma: the strings (Thomastik) are wound with cotton at the ball end and won't fit into the bridge pins. I end up with just less than an eighth of an inch of string below the pin inserted inside the guitar. I'm just referring to the low E as I haven't gotten past that point. I've got other strings but I really wanted to try these.....

[guitarist21]

I had this problem when I was trying some strings on my Washburn. I just gave up and put them on my Gibson LG-0. Sorry man. I'm interested to see if anyone has a creative solution.

 

Ellen

[Samilyn]

I'm not quite sure what you mean by an eighth of an inch of string below the pin. If it's what I think it means, stop right there and re-seat the string. See, the ball should sit snugly against the plate inside with no extra string in there.

 

What I do is, first put a slight bend in the end of the string about an eighth of an inch up from the ball. Then I insert the string with the bend pointing downward, the ball angling towards the neck once it's inside the git.

 

Then insert the pin about halfway and begin to pull the string taught. I can feel when the ball is snug against the plate because at that point, I can hold the string taught, yet move the pin up and down without the string coming loose.

 

Then apply a bit of thumb pressure to seat the pin firmly, but not too tight.

 

Alternatively, you can try a different set of pins that have deeper grooves in them.

[Berkleo]

 

I'm not quite sure what you mean by an eighth of an inch of string below the pin. If it's what I think it means, stop right there and re-seat the string. See, the ball should sit snugly against the plate inside with no extra string in there. What I do is, first put a slight bend in the end of the string about an eighth of an inch up from the ball. Then I insert the string with the bend pointing downward, the ball angling towards the neck once it's inside the git. Then insert the pin about halfway and begin to pull the string taught. I can feel when the ball is snug against the plate because at that point, I can hold the string taught, yet move the pin up and down without the string coming loose. Then apply a bit of thumb pressure to seat the pin firmly, but not too tight.

 

 

Hi Samilyn,

 

Can't reseat the string, it's too fat and won't fit into the bridge pin. And the bridge pin hole is also too small to accommodate the string AND the pin. I think I'm just gonna have to cut my losses and try different strings.

[Freeman Keller]

It is not uncommon for the ball end of some strings (particularly the low E on medium sets) to not fit in the slot in the pin. One solution is to relieve the slot (with a plastic pin just use a little file or wrap some sandpaper around something pointed. Now put some magic marker ink on the bottom of that pin so you know that it goes in the low E hole.

 

Maybe a better solution is to relieve the bridge itself - in fact the best is probably to have the bridge "slotted" which grooves that fit each string. I do it with a small burr on my Dremel, you can also use small files.

 

http://www.bryankimsey.com/bridges/slotted.htm

[Samilyn]

 

Hi Samilyn, Can't reseat the string, it's too fat and won't fit into the bridge pin. And the bridge pin hole is also too small to accommodate the string AND the pin. I think I'm just gonna have to cut my losses and try different strings.

 

 

Oh, I see. That's a bummer. But you don't have to waste an expensive set of strings. There are a couple of solutions, as Freeman said. And if you don't want to file a deeper groove in your existing pins, get another set to experiment with.

 

Plastic pins aren't budget busters. Then if you decide to stick with the Thomastik strings, you can adjust your good pins and/or your bridge.