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Author Topic: String guages for lower tunings  (Read 10694 times)

TonyGibson

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String guages for lower tunings
« on: February 13, 2007, 02:01:52 AM »
What do y'all use for tuning to D, C, or B standard? I put together a set of my own for my Ibanez...basically I took the bottom 3 strings of the Zakk Wylde 10 set, and replaced the top 3 with GHS 11's.

Anyone have any other sets they recommend? I was also checking out Ernie Ball not even Slinkies.
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BloodMountain

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Re: String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #1 on: February 13, 2007, 08:33:27 AM »
Quote from: TonyGibson
What do y'all use for tuning to D, C, or B standard? I put together a set of my own for my Ibanez...basically I took the bottom 3 strings of the Zakk Wylde 10 set, and replaced the top 3 with GHS 11's.

Anyone have any other sets they recommend? I was also checking out Ernie Ball not even Slinkies.


what tuning do you use that lot for?
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Mr Ed

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #2 on: February 13, 2007, 10:44:00 AM »
When I went down to D, I used .12's and when I went down to C for a short time I found that .13's were the best... plus a re-setup/intonation check of the ol' guitar of course.
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TonyGibson

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Re: String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #3 on: February 13, 2007, 02:38:46 PM »
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
Quote from: TonyGibson
What do y'all use for tuning to D, C, or B standard? I put together a set of my own for my Ibanez...basically I took the bottom 3 strings of the Zakk Wylde 10 set, and replaced the top 3 with GHS 11's.

Anyone have any other sets they recommend? I was also checking out Ernie Ball not even Slinkies.


what tuning do you use that lot for?


C standard...for fun (and education) I'm learning a bunch of old In Flames and Arch Enemy songs.
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BloodMountain

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #4 on: February 13, 2007, 02:55:42 PM »
aren't the 3 high strings too loose?
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TonyGibson

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #5 on: February 13, 2007, 03:42:42 PM »
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
aren't the 3 high strings too loose?


Not with the bottom 3 being the Zakk "10" set. The 10's that it originally came with are way too lose, that's why I replaced them with 11's.
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BloodMountain

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #6 on: February 13, 2007, 03:43:56 PM »
Quote from: TonyGibson
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
aren't the 3 high strings too loose?


Not with the bottom 3 being the Zakk "10" set. The 10's that it originally came with are way too lose, that's why I replaced them with 11's.


how does the bottom strings being thick make the higher stings more tense?  :?
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TonyGibson

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #7 on: February 13, 2007, 04:07:06 PM »
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
Quote from: TonyGibson
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
aren't the 3 high strings too loose?


Not with the bottom 3 being the Zakk "10" set. The 10's that it originally came with are way too lose, that's why I replaced them with 11's.


how does the bottom strings being thick make the higher stings more tense?  :?


Here's what I mean...the "Stock" Zakk Wylde set is horribly unbalanced. Check it out:
10, 13, 17, 36, 52, 60

So what I had done was taken the bottom 3 (36, 52, 60) and tossed the top three in the trash (10, 13, 17).

That leaves me with the bottom 3...so now I need a new top 3 strings, and I use the GHS 11's like so: 11, 15, 18

So basically my set now looks like this: 11, 15, 18, 36, 52, 60 as opposed to the original: 10, 13, 17, 36, 52, 60
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BloodMountain

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #8 on: February 13, 2007, 05:23:07 PM »
i understand that, yeah... but i meant something else, but that doesn't matter really....

wouldn't the 11s still be too light though?
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TonyGibson

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #9 on: February 13, 2007, 07:13:21 PM »
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
i understand that, yeah... but i meant something else, but that doesn't matter really....

wouldn't the 11s still be too light though?


They're not too light, but they're not exactly what I want...which is why my next setup on my CWP equipped Ibanez will have the following guages for C Standard tuning:

12, 16, 19, 36, 52, 60
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BloodMountain

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #10 on: February 13, 2007, 08:51:39 PM »
Quote from: TonyGibson
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
i understand that, yeah... but i meant something else, but that doesn't matter really....

wouldn't the 11s still be too light though?


They're not too light, but they're not exactly what I want...which is why my next setup on my CWP equipped Ibanez will have the following guages for C Standard tuning:

12, 16, 19, 36, 52, 60


thats killer!
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MDV

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #11 on: February 14, 2007, 01:19:05 AM »
As a general rule of thumb 0.001 difference is equivelant to half a step. This gets mixed up if you mix sets but basically 10s in Eb will have the same tension as 9s in E and so on.

personally I go:
D: 10-56
C: Dont play in it but if I did I'd detune one of my C# guitars which is 11-60
B: 11-70
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OD-Black_Fire

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #12 on: February 14, 2007, 01:29:30 AM »
Standard 24.75 scale guitar: .11-54
Standard 24.75 scale guitar: .10-.52
Drop D: Same as standards. I don't have enough guitars for all those seperate tunnings, plus its just fine dropped.

I remember going down to Eb on my .11-54 and no $%&#ing way it was like a .10-52 in standard. Still stronger.
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MDV

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #13 on: February 14, 2007, 01:34:59 AM »
Oh, yeah: all my guitars are 25.5

I just aint got no time fo nuttin else,yo.
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nfe

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String guages for lower tunings
« Reply #14 on: February 14, 2007, 01:11:55 PM »
Quote from: BLOODMOUNTAIN
i understand that, yeah... but i meant something else, but that doesn't matter really....

wouldn't the 11s still be too light though?


I find 11's too light in E lol.


13's for anything lower than E for me, and a wound 3rd at all times. Big plain strings sound horrible, like they're always choking.
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