ubit

I must be the only one who doesn't give a hoot about measurements. I do it by feel. Take it down until I get fret buzz then take it back up. Play hard and hear if I get clicking and if so back it off a bit more.

I don't have a clue what height in mm or thou or gnats ball hairs it is!

Who would pay that? There are so many quality instruments out there for 3/400 quid and this guy wants £1000 for this?

16 hours ago, bassman7755 said:

Yeah I tried boiling and it works but it stresses and corrodes the strings, only time Ive ever had a bass string breakage was with strings boiled multiple times.

Yeah, as I say, I only boiled the strings more than once on a couple of occasions as I found the second boiling didn't bring out the newness as much.

I did start buying strings from Amazon or Ebay that were cheap stainless and were pretty good. not quite as bright as Rotosounds or Elites but they did the job for a fraction of the price. If you are a prolific changer like me it works out cheaper.

My brother in law is a fantastic guitar player and a while back he asked me if he could borrow my American P for some recording he was doing. I reluctantly agreed as I had only just restrung it with brand new Rotosound steels. He gave it back to me a few weeks later and the strings were dead. I couldn't believe it. Not happy!

34 minutes ago, bassman7755 said:

I have two bases I for which I keep 4 sets of strings in rotation - 2 on the basses and 2 soaking in a methylated spirit bath. Swap out a set with the freshly cleaned set about once every 2 weeks, the 4 sets last almost indefinitely and I get a very consistent bright sound, the meths doesn't bring them back to absolute new but its good enough. Using headless bases with double ball end strings makes the constant swapping very easy and doesn't stress the strings.

I found boiling got more crud out than meths but to be fair I didn't leave them soaking for days. Ive heard people saying that boiling rusts the core but I never noticed any difference in sound plus I didn't boil them more than twice. Second time never had as good results.

22 hours ago, Reggaebass said:

I suppose it depends on what you play, I don’t like new strings, most of the strings on my basses are between 5 and 15 years old ,and if I need more I usually advertise for used flats, but they obviously wouldn’t be any good if you wanted that nice bright tone for slapping or funk 

Definitely mate. You play reggae and dub so old strings would suit this more. I like rounds with the new ring for rock and indie. We did cover Iron Lion Zion right enough and I pushed the bass for this. Turned down the tone and gave my bass dial a wee tweak. It worked ok for me even with new rounds but I'm sure aficionados of this genre like your good self would consider this wrong.

52 minutes ago, borntohang said:

I set the relief till it's choking around the 9th to 12th frets and then dial it back a bit so I can dig in and get a little rattle but not when I play softly. Action gets set the same - down until it's rattling and then back off a touch. It's not an exact science for me. 

Same. I take it until I get buzz and then back off.

Clearly everyone has a different idea of what a bright sounding string sounds like. Granted I sweat a lot when playing under lights and in busy bars but I find strings less bright after one gig. I used to wipe my strings with a beer mat after every song but still found them going too dull for my liking. I have found no strings stay bright for more than three gigs tops. As I say, if I could afford it I would change strings every gig.

20 hours ago, BassAdder27 said:

Just put a set of Dunlop Super Bright nickel roundwounds on my PBass and it’s funny how you forget that great zingy tone that slowly dies off after playing. 
 

Also trying Prosteels ( stainless) on my Yamaha to see how they last or eat frets.

 

Both now very zingy and clear bottom end when played fingers. No need for pick to get that clarity now

 

If only you could have this consistent tone from a set of strings more than a few weeks !

A like minded soul. I just love the sound of brand new rounds. I use stainless (mainly because I am allergic to nickel and when I sweat it irritates my fingers) but I also love the brightness of stainless. I tried Elixirs as their coated guitar strings are great but I found them dull sounding. I used to change my strings after three gigs and that was because I couldn't afford to change them every gig. I boiled them up to get another couple of gigs out of them.

I just hate the sound of dull strings.

I started buying cheap packs of ten stainless online which made it slightly cheaper.

I have always thought of action as something you do by preference. Many years ago I tried to have really low action because I thought that would make me faster and smoother. I ended up with clicking coming out of my speaker. It was only when someone said you can hear that out front that I realised how bad it was and so  I raised the action and it disappeared.

Whatever is comfortable for you would be my answer. Some people prefer low, some high.

35 minutes ago, Nail Soup said:

I posted this clip a while back and got a lot of comments which disagreed with his take on time signatures.

And a few who didn’t like his hat.

Apologies, I never saw your post.

I came across this whilst perusing through You tube. The guy is quite annoying but the gist is quite interesting and he certainly knows his time signatures.

I always kept my leads in good nick and cleaned them of spilt drink, crud etc whenever I got home but the rest of the band were not so diligent. I made sure I only had working leads and chucked any dodgy ones away but the others had intermittent faults in their leads. I had to mark my leads with tape as their dodgy leads always "got mixed up" with mine.

It's too late. lugging that great thing around has it's side effects!

Budget guitars are so much better these days than they were 15 or 20 years ago. Some of the £100+ guitars are amazing. When I started and you paid £100 for  a guitar you got a plank!

Youtube has loads of reviews of budget guitars that are amazing to play and look at.

24 minutes ago, SteveXFR said:

Max load capacity 150kg. Do they have a heavy duty version for Trace Elliot cabs?

It wouldn't be strong enough to hold my SVT 2 Pro amp head  then!

Have big hair, will disco!

2 hours ago, Kiwi said:

12 hours ago, 4000 said:

The WHOLE band vibe had changed. 

It wasn't due to the bass player.

Is that not what 'e said?

8 hours ago, 4000 said:

I did see eventually see them with Nick Fyffe but it wasn’t the same, no disrespect to Nick, who is a great player. The whole band vibe had changed. 

Apparently Nick Fyffe was joining a Jamiroquai tribute band when he got the shout to join the real band so he must have been able to handle Zenders bass parts to a decent enough standard.

https://fb.watch/8tdzQYc-AJ/

You have to ask yourself what most of the originals were using. I would agree P bass all the way. obviously there are a few exceptions but in general that's what folk used. P bass with the treble turned up.

I'm sure you will come up with a decent sound mate as the sound in your classic rock set up is spot on.

I'm more a Lidl man myself, so no help here.

49 minutes ago, StickyDBRmf said:

I'm listening to everything on this page on top of each other. Tell me I'm the first to do this.

I posted ages ago that I had started right at page one and was working my way through and finding some real gems. Im at page 64 so far.

Live wire, an AC/DC tribute band playing locally. We saw them before and they were excellent.

I honestly have no idea when I became a fingers player. I definitely started playing with a pick but at some point I have changed and I am buggered if I can remember why or when. I like to play pick for some songs because of the attack but I admit to not being great with a pick. Certainly with string skipping.

Geddy Lee manages to get great attack and a pick sound from playing with his fingers, so it's not always down to the hard plastic creating a good percussive sound.