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Thread: Ball-ends

  1. #1
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    I just got a 4-string electric solid-body mando with a ball-end bridge. I found one set of 8-string ball-end strings (GHS PFBM BRONZE BALL-END MANDOLIN STRING SET) at elderly. Can I just split this set up and use it as two sets?
    Is there a better option?

  2. #2
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    www.emando.com sells ball end sets for emandos. Adamas makes ball end sets for emandos. You can always figure out which individual gauges you like for each string and buy single guitar strings, or find sets of guitar strings that contain the gauges you use. It's A LOT easier to find electric guitar strings. WWW.juststrings.com has a glossary that explains a lot of the differences in strings, as well as many brands of mando strings. WWW.stringitup.com has good pictures of various string types and construction techniques. If you get the chance, try some flat-wound or semi-flat wound strings, they give a different sound, make less noise when you slide your fingers on them, and are very easy on the fingers. Good luck.
    Forget with the cowbell, already...

  3. #3
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    Yes, I know Phos-Bronze is not magnetic. Keep in mind too that not all magnetic pickups mounted on an e-mando were designed to be used that way. And there's certainly no amplifiers that have been designed for electric mandolins. I have found some electric wound strings played through some e-mandos on some amps to be overly boomey and a phos-bronze or bronze string gave a more balanced tone across all 4 or 5 strings.
    Wye Knot

  4. #4
    coprolite mandroid's Avatar
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    The Core wire is what is usually what the magnet/coil pickup picks ,er, up. and many alloys in addition to bronze are not magnetizable , but are used to effect increasing the mass of the string, and thus the way it vibrates across the magnetic field.
    nickle plated steel windings , certainly, but nickle and monel and some stainless alloys contain no iron , but they add mass and thus vibrate at an appropriate tension for the pitch needed.
    I stuck some of the loops over some recycled guitar balls and use 2 strings on each ball on the thru body type ferrules on my 8 string FM61se, EMG pickup, ghs a250 bronze strings. plenty of output of g and d , a level similar to the other ones..

    when i change them , maybe something different , next time, , in the meantime its good enuff..
    writing about music
    is like dancing,
    about architecture

  5. #5
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    Not that it's important; the 300 series stainless steel is not magnetic until its been work hardened.
    The early Schwab e-mandos used Seymour-Duncan humbuckers and the builder told me he worked with the S-D factory through a few different windings until they got it just right. Steve Ryder is another person who makes custom wound pick-ups designed for e-mandos. I couldn't begin to explain what makes them specific to e-mandos though.
    I have a set of Thomastik lites on a Gibson EM-200 and found it to be an awesome set-up.
    Wye Knot

  6. #6
    coprolite mandroid's Avatar
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    FWIW: Machinerys handbook: Austentitic stainless can be slightly magnetic after cold working. annealed no, drawing to smaller wire guage is a cold process [there is another whole ferritic alloy group and a Martensitic one also] SO which alloy makes a difference.
    after all, AlNiCo in the right combination IS a magnet..
    writing about music
    is like dancing,
    about architecture

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