MIMF

I've done a few, but all of them pretty subjective. On my main guitar, which has a split saddle, I ended up with a piece of agate on the wound strings and bone on the unwound strings. Based solely on subjective A/B testing. I had also included brass, aluminum, and tusq in the tested materials. Anyon...

I use two instruments that both have some fairly heavy wound strings. On my baritone acoustic, the 6th string is a .070", and on my standard-scale Lowden where I regularly tune the 6th down to a B, I use either a standard .056" or even a .060". These strings are thick enough that they...

Love it. Always something new to learn! Many thanks.

"Is my "feels right on the edge of breaking as I tune it" feeling just likely to be off in this case?" Plain strings (not overwound) of a given alloy will break at a given - pitch - irrespective of their thickness. The thinner string will have less tension to reach breaking pitc...

So I recently wanted to try an experiment with my Lowden. I find myself capoing up a lot, whether in standard, DADGAD, or other tunings. This is just to get my voice closer to its sweet spot. So using the string tension calculator at http://chordgen.rattree.co.uk/tensiontool.php , I figured that to ...

You could also try changing out the plain second .018 string for a wound .020 gauge string. Thick unwound strings are pretty stiff. I had wondered about this as a possibility. It always seemed a little strange to me that the second string was plain steel...as if the makers of the sets were simply t...

Thanks, all. I will try to get some decent glue and report back. I very much appreciate the insights!

Jason, based on what you just wrote, I think yours must have been the posts I was reading when I first started researching this issue. I did try retuning up and down a step, and although the string seems to like more tension, that doesn't feel like the issue: the deadness seems to stay in the same l...

All good questions. Truss rod: I have not gotten adventurous enough to try bottoming it out. But based on other instruments, I would have expected something to start happening by the time there is a 1/4" of rod exposed beyond the nut. Maybe I am being too timid? Fret leveling after correcting b...

Hello, all. First post here. I'm not a luthier, but I did a bit of training under one when I used to work at a music store. So I know just enough to be dangerous, more than likely. I have done a fair amount of work on my own instruments, though, including basic fret leveling and crowning, and some r...