string gauge opinions

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it's about time to re-sting my '61 starfire III ... i was listening to a Rev. Horton Heat interview, and he extolled the virtues of flatwound strings on his 6120 ... but he also said that in them olden days, guys used heavier gauge strings (there weren't really light gauge ones then, I suppose) ... anyhoo, I'd love to hear some opinions. Thanks!
 

GGJaguar

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Flats can sound good on some guitars for sure (I like them on my Gretsch 12-string). Any guitar I have with a Bigsby get 11s or 12s and I like pure nickel roundwounds with Dynasonics. Strings are cheap so you can do some experimenting to see what sounds best on that guitar for the music you play.
 

Quantum Strummer

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I love flatwounds on hollowbody electrics and some solidbodies too. Thomastik Jazz/Swings are fairly low tension…a set of 12s feels a lot like a typical roundwound 11 set. Not cheap but tonally they're crisp on top, punchy-with-some-twang on the bottom and they last a long time.

-Dave-
 

PittPastor

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I love flatwounds on hollowbody electrics and some solidbodies too. Thomastik Jazz/Swings are fairly low tension…a set of 12s feels a lot like a typical roundwound 11 set. Not cheap but tonally they're crisp on top, punchy-with-some-twang on the bottom and they last a long time.

-Dave-

I completely agree. They are pricey though!

(One of the nicest things about the flatwounds is they remove the squeak when you slide up the string.)
 

kakerlak

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Flats can be fun. If you bend the G string a lot, you may hate them. In my experience, wounds G strings seem to need bend physically farther across the fretboard to achieve the same rise in pitch and I always found that disconcerting. It also found it a little painful, as it feels like the string runs out of "give" for lack of a better term, before it reaches that whole-step bend and you have to really push it hard to get the note there.
 

parker_knoll

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Flats are darker than round. I would guess your '61 has DeArmonds, in which case you can go either way. Do you find it too bright? if so, give 'em a go. Another alternative is Monel strings, slightly darker than regular or even pure nickel, and a genuine vintage sound. Pyramid and Martin do them, and possibly others
 

davismanLV

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Maybe not in keeping with this topic, but in the early days of owning my Guild D65S I was practicing in a lot of Joni Mitchell tunings (far more jazz oriented) and not having very good skills and poor technique going up and down the fretboard, I put a set of flatwounds on my maple steel string flat top guitar. Strangely enough, they didn't sound bad at all and i could fly up and down the fretboard with SCREECHING kept to a minimum. Later I went back to roundwounds and realized how sloppy I'd been and had to clean up my technique, but the flatwounds were fun and they sounded a whole lot better than I or anyone else would have guessed. Probably a testament to my guitar more than anything. Now I'm careful and no more screeching or at least very little. It was fun there for a bit, though!!
 

jp

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I've tried both flat and rounds on my T-100D -- both 10s, 11s as well as flat 12s. I have flatwound 13s on my CE-100D. I've always used mostly D'addarios for affordability. I think your preference may depend on the kind of music you like to play as well as the pickups you have. Do you have one of those beautiful '61 Starfire white Dearmonds?

Roundwounds definitely have more snap and brightness, while flatwounds will have more warmth, the "thuddy" pick attack, and comfort with less finger noise. I've also tried half rounds, but I think they're a bit of a wishy-washy compromise. I'm actually about to string up some extra light flatwound 10s with a wound third on my T-100D that seem interesting.

For me it's all about getting the tone I like for what I'm playing. I play kind of hard, like a boar stomping through a tulip garden -- LOL, working on changing that -- so I can adapt physically to thicker strings. I have Franz PUs on my T-100, so they work well with a variety of strings. I tend to like the T-100D for surfy, rockabilly, and quacky southern funk, so we'll see if how the flat 10s work out.
 

iamjethro

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My Starfire III has 10s on it. I like it fine and have not had problems with tuning or intonation.
 

Guildadelphia

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I'm a big fan of pure nickel round wound strings. I was using pure nickel 10-46's on my NS X175B but I recently moved up a gauge to pure nickel 11-48's and I really like them. The tone is fatter / bigger and the high end is smoother/rounder. The guitar feels just as easy to player (in fact, with the 11's I was able to set the neck relief to just about dead flat w/ the string height at the 12th fret on the low E at 4/64ths and the high E at 3/64ths with absolutely no buzzing or rattling).
 
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ras1500

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I have always had flat wound strings on my Starfire III. Usually it is strung with Thomastik-Infeld Jazz Swing 11's. However, just out of curiosity, I installed T-I George Benson 12's. They are expensive, and are definitely darker in tone than the Jazz Swings. The George Benson's are well balanced and intonate very well. If they ever wear out, I'll be going back to the Jazz Swings as that tone is more to my liking.
 

Brad Little

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.... in them olden days, guys used heavier gauge strings (there weren't really light gauge ones then, I suppose) ... anyhoo, I'd love to hear some opinions. Thanks!
Heavy strings were common for swing players, almost a necessity for Freddie Green style four to the bar comping. I've used 13s on my AA at times, although roundwound if I'm playing it mostly acoustically. I remember reading somewhere that some of the acoustic swing players went as high as 15 for the e string. I generally use flatwounds on my X170 and Epi HR. Just put 11s on the Epi.
 

shihan

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I’m going to be the contrarian here; I hate flatwounds. Over the years I’ve tried them several times, and was always disappointed in the dead, lifeless tone; even from the expensive brands. I know some of my favorite players (hi Wes) used them, but they’re not for me. I’m with Guildadelphia, pure nickel 11’s do it for me. Just my opinion, as usual, no criticism of others implied or intended.
 

Quantum Strummer

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I have always had flat wound strings on my Starfire III. Usually it is strung with Thomastik-Infeld Jazz Swing 11's. However, just out of curiosity, I installed T-I George Benson 12's. They are expensive, and are definitely darker in tone than the Jazz Swings. The George Benson's are well balanced and intonate very well. If they ever wear out, I'll be going back to the Jazz Swings as that tone is more to my liking.

For a long time I had Thomastik George Benson 12s on my Gretsch Chet Atkins. One set lasted ~15 years! Recently switched to Jazz Swing 12s and really like the snappier tone and IMO better string balance (less heavy on the bottom).

-Dave-
 

GAD

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I’m going to be the contrarian here; I hate flatwounds. Over the years I’ve tried them several times, and was always disappointed in the dead, lifeless tone; even from the expensive brands. I know some of my favorite players (hi Wes) used them, but they’re not for me. I’m with Guildadelphia, pure nickel 11’s do it for me. Just my opinion, as usual, no criticism of others implied or intended.

I always hated flatwounds until I put them on my Artist Award. Holy smokes that guitar just sings with them.
 

DeArmond Hammer

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Has anyone else tried double-wrap strings? I generally like flatwounds on a jazz box, but I put Newtone Archtop strings on my big old National archtop and I like them a lot! They have a big round sound, but they're mellower and less springy sounding than regular roundwounds. Supposedly the double wind is more like a piano string.
 

Walter Broes

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I've had 11 rounds on my archtops for over 20 years, used D'Addario XL's for a long time, then discovered the virtues of pure nickel strings with oldschool single coil pickups, and have been using Pyramid roundcore 11's for about four years now.

Strings are a matter of taste, the kind of guitar sounds you go for, style of music, etc...

Flatwounds are an acquired taste. I never use them on stage because for me, in a Rock and Roll setting, they're plain not loud enough, but I hàve used them in the studio, and I keep the occasional set of flats on one of my guitars. I don't like the typical "bleep bloop" smooth dark "Jazz" sound a lot of people get from flats, but I do like flats a lot with bright single coil pickups like strats or teles, or indeed the DeArmond pickups in my 61 Starfire III.

You can get a very dry hard twang from flats and single coils, like what you'd hear on a 50's Honky Tonk Country record, good surf guitar sounds, vintage rock sounds that aren't as bright and jangly as a lot of modern cleaner tones. That said - there is a persistent myth about flats that in the earlier days of electric guitar up to the late 50's, flats were the standard guitar string, all you could get, and that's just not true. A lot of Fenders *shipped* with flats, apparently, but I think that was more a case of Fender pushing their more expensive string choice than anything else.
 
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