Strings and Nuts...

[sunvalleylaw]

Went in and Chip Booth, local monster player, checked out the bridge saddle for me, ok'd it, and gave me a re-stringing seminar with new D'Addarios, 010-046. Local legendary luthier Bozo Cardoza watched on and added his stringing tips, so I felt in very good hands. I may order a set of Elixir Nanos to try next time.

[marnold***]

Marnold - Thanks for the different point of view. For me, as to size, my strat had 10s on there but I don't know if it was up to 046 or 052. The strings on there are not hard on my hands. I am more used to acoustic strings, and if anything, I am ham fisted fisted enough on my electric to bend the string out of tune when I fret the note or chord as a result. Obviously I need to clean that up, but I don't think I will go lighter in size at this point. Thanks guys.

The funny thing is that I was a bass player in a former life, so I'm used to huge strings. The problem is with bending the unwound ones. I would imagine if I could play more often (read: as often as I would like) I would eventually get to the same point you are and grip chords too tightly. I also get flashbacks to my early attempts to play acoustic which was painful and generally awful. Part of it was bigger strings. Part of it was the horrific action on my cheapo guitar. That made playing the guitar a chore and an exercise in frustration. Where's the fun in that?

[tot_Ou_tard]

Steve
Find out where the string broke before you shell out a daily lift ticket price for Elixers. If you have a burr on a bridge saddle then you surely want to attend to that before rupturing another more expensive and hard to replace string.

Well I just broke the b-string at the bridge on my Godin Radiator. I only ever break the b or the g. I was doing some bass & strum rhythm work with a thick pick. I was probably hitting the treble strings too hard. I looked & couldn't see any burr. How would I polish up the saddle? Use steel wool? Sandpaper? Get a file?

Thanks!

[Spudman***]

Try a little 1500 grit wet dry paper where the string touches the saddle.

[tot_Ou_tard]

Try a little 1500 grit wet dry paper where the string touches the saddle.

Thanks Spud. I'll do that today.

[tot_Ou_tard]

I just polished all the saddles on my Radiator with wet 1500 grit sandpaper as well as buffing up the rosewood fretboard with 0000 grade steel wool, & then I used a little Gerlitz guitar honey on the board.

I restrung it with 10's. It was the cleanest restring that I have ever done. New strings are always so sweet. I like the 10s better than 11s I had on there. I put the 11s on because at some point I plan to turn the radiator into my slide gitbox (tuned to open G). But that time isn't yet, so back to 10s I went.

Tomorrow I will top off the intonation. Thanks for the help.

[r_a_smith3530]

My G&L S-500 (strat) and my Peavey Reactor (tele) both wear/wore .010-.046 D'Addario XLs. I installed a set of Graph-Tech StringSaver Saddles on my Reactor and I have to say that I've never broken a string on it, and that's with numerous 1 1/2+ step bends.

[tot_Ou_tard]

Yeah, if I continue to break strings, then it'll be graph-techs for me too.