Want to tune baritone 8 string to low octave GCEA or GDAE

[pinkmoon]

I've been trying to find an octave mandolin with nylon strings and it has been pretty much impossible. So I really want to take a Baritone 8 string like this one and put thicker strings on it and tune it to GCEA or GDAE (mandolin) an octave below the standard uke tuning and in unisons for every string not octaves on the first two strings.

Has anyone tried this? What strings would work? What is an ideal string tension for a uke like this?

Thanks a ton!

[Neil Russell]

I use D'Addario J76 on my 21-22.5 Octave Mandolins ,if this helps.

[Seter]

I don't know what your budget is or where you're located, but MandolinCafe member/luthier Dusepo builds a lot of interesting nylon string instruments, you might contact her to see what could be feasible.

Otherwise I'd probably just get two packs of D'Addario hard tension classical guitar strings and use the relevant strings stringing it up (described in this post) and see how that works.

[Jim Garber]

pinkmoon: I have both the tenor and concert version of that uke and they are both very nice instruments. I have them tuned to uke but I like your idea of making a low tuned nylon strung octave mandolin. I might want to so that too. I bet ot would sound great if you can find the correct strings.

I guess you can try the strings mentioned on the link that Seter supplied above. Another possibility is to contact Aquila directly. They will spec out a custom set of strings if you give them the scale length and what tuning you will use.

[pinkmoon]

OK so I ordered one of those Kala 8 string baritone ukes but the sound was very plastic and not nearly rich enough so I didn't bother changing the strings and returned it. I have an 8 string Kala TENOR uke and it sounds much better. I think the baritone 8 string concept was awesome in theory but in practice it doesn't make sense. The tenor has a similar glassy / plastic quality but in a much better way. Also if I had decided to put thicker strings on it I don't think the sound would have been rich enough and they would have been too close together. I would have had to re-cut the nut (not comfortable with that).

The FANTASTIC news is that I also got a much cheaper Kala KA-B baritone *4* stringer and put thicker strings on it and it is amazing. Probably my favorite instrument other than a classical guitar that I have played. After some trial and error I think I have come up with the perfect strings for GDAE octave mandolin tuning on a baritone UKE. People have been posting on forums saying to use the 6th string of a classical guitar, move the 4th string of a bari set to the 3rd string, then leave the other two. I actually tried to use the 6th, 5th, 3rd, and 2nd strings from an extra hard tension D'addario pro arte nylon pack and it was awesome on the bottom two strings but I really do not like the sound of the clear nylon (classical guitar) strings on the bari uke. I do single string tremolo with a pick and they are way to plastic and loud with the pick attack, and also dull. I wish I had just kept the top two Aquila super nylgut strings on there like people have mentioned. So after all that experimentation I went a step further and realized I could use the 3rd string from a tenor aquila nylgut set for the 2nd string on the baritone (gd*A*e) which would make it closer tension to what the 2nd string usually is.

Here is what I will try for the baritone uke GDAE octave mandolin strings:


I think the .040" classical guitar string might be a little light but the tension on these baritone sets are so low that I think it will fit it better. The .045" extra tension classical guitar 6th string is BEASTLY and beautiful but right now overpowers the top two strings a ton. I'm shocked at how much tone you can get out of a baritone tuned to G with a classical guitar string. Truly surprising like a small guitar.

[kjbllc]

for the tenor I used the tenor 5ths uke, then replaced the low E with a High E from a charango set , it work fine. Although the tenor set with the low E sounded pretty good also.

[Jim Garber]

Pinkmoon: did you get this baritone KA-B? That looks like it is all laminated, correct?

This is the solid cedar top 4-string version. Just curious which one you ended up with.

[pinkmoon]

Yes I got the KA-B. It probably is laminate but it sounds great to my ears. I didn't want to spend a bunch before knowing how much I'd like it. I can see myself getting a nicer baritone and soprano some time though since I love them so much. Especially tuned in fifths. The fake gut strings are so much more pleasing than steel to me these days. While tremolo on one string is hard I have been inspired by domra players and they have no trouble at all making that sound good. Granted those are steel strings but it has a mellow tone somehow... wish I knew more about that instrument.

The important thing I learned is that the tenor 3rd string on the 2nd tuned to A is dull compared to just leaving the 2nd baritone string where it is and tuning it down a step. Absolutely prefer the sound of the regular bari 2nd so much more. It is a surprisingly consistent setup - using the 1st (E), 2nd (A), and 4th (D) from the bari set, and .04" classical wound string (G).