Mystery flatwound strings - med/light + dark blue silk both ends - any ideas, folks?

[DunRockin]

... on a great Squier CV Pbass I bought recently. I'd like to buy some more but the prev owner is unsure of the brand, but they're not going to be anything really expensive or obscure since he thought they might be Rotos, but no likely Rotos are dark blue silked.
So - they be dark ('royal') blue silk at both ends with ball ends plain/uncoloured. I'm not at all familiar with flats, but the flat windings are very, very close and strings feel completely sheer. And the tension is clearly no more than rounds. If anything slightly flappier.

I've done a lot of Googling but can't find anything conclusive - a few dark blue silked candidates but - the ball ends are not coloured so they're not D' Addarios and they're medium gauge at most so they're not La Bella Jamersons...

The best contenders seems to be medium La Bellas or Ernie Balls, but I'd really appreciate any other ideas.
Cheers.

No camera/camera phone so no pics unfortunately...

Edited November 13, 2014 by DunRockin

[Beer of the Bass]

They sound like they could be Ernie Balls. The silks on those are a very similar colour to the ones on Chromes, but with brass ball ends. You can just about make out the colour in my avatar picture.
LaBellas are not widely stocked in the UK, so if the previous owner walked into a music shop and asked for whatever flats they had, Ernie Balls are a more likely candidate.

Edited November 13, 2014 by Beer of the Bass

[DunRockin]

Cheers for the reply. The silks on these I have are quite a bit darker than those in your avatar, though, which is helpful since it suggests they're not Ernies as previously thought.

[booboo]

Overwater flats maybe? I used to have some and remember the surface being v smooth and may have had silk as you describe but tbh I can't remember. I don't recall them being particularly light, but I didn't need to tweak the truss on my (skinny) jazz neck so maybe they were. I'm sure there must be a few tb-ers using overwater flats and they will either confirm my suspicions as true (or b***ocks).

[sblueplanet]

Ernie Ball flats springs to mind.

[DunRockin]

Thanks, guys. I suspect that being darker blue silked they're not Ernies, but perhaps Ernies come close to whatever they are.
I Googled some more but to no more avail. This is a real mystery.

[Billy Apple]

Fender have blue silk

[happynoj]

If I remember rightly, the last Ernie Balls I had were more of a sky blue. I definitely wouldn't have described them as royal blue. This sort of shade:



But a google image search has also brought up this:






And [url="http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/newbay/bptt/#/38"]this link[/url] suggests that they could be D'addarios.




Also, I had some Fenders and the wrapping was a shade of green which matched the colour shown in the above link

Edited November 14, 2014 by happynoj

[DunRockin]

Cheers, guys.
@Billy Apple - Thanks, I thought Fenders were all green silked.

@happynoj -That colour in the bridge shot is very similar, but afaik D'Addarios have coloured ball ends, which those in the pic don't, but they look like a contender.
I can't find that bridge pic via a Google image using the most likely search terms, which terms did you use? I could contact the poster if I could trace him.

[DunRockin]

@happynoj - I found the source of the 5 string bridge pic you posted - hope it's OK to link to another bass forum -

[url="http://www.talkbass.com/threads/silk-colors.717720/page-3#post-12784174"]http://www.talkbass....3#post-12784174[/url]

And the poster says they're Ernies... so either Ernie do a darker blue silked or the flash is making them appear darker than they are...

[drTStingray]

[quote name='DunRockin' timestamp='1415911146' post='2605242']
So - they be dark ('royal') blue silk at both ends with ball ends plain/uncoloured. I'm not at all familiar with flats, but the flat windings are very, very close and strings feel completely sheer. And the tension is clearly no more than rounds. If anything slightly flappier.
[/quote]

The strings on my fretless Stingray match this description exactly - they are Ernie Ball group 3 flatwounds. Can't upload pics from phone unfortunately.

Re another reply in this thread - I've also had green wrapped strings - they were Rotosound Solo bass (half wound - mid way between flats and rounds).

[DunRockin]

Aha - thanks, drT - with your info it's now looking almost conclusively as though 'tis The Ernie s I'm after.
Thanks again to everyone for their help!

[StringPing.com]

[quote name='DunRockin' timestamp='1416009314' post='2606226']
@happynoj -That colour in the bridge shot is very similar, but afaik D'Addarios have coloured ball ends, which those in the pic don't, but they look like a contender.
[/quote]

D'Addario do have coloured ball ends, but some of their strings do have silked ends. These are D'Addario Chromes, apparently.



Does that look similar? Here's a link - in one of the pictures we can see the coloured ball ends on the back of the bass - http://antebelluminstruments.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/c20022013-hot-rod-fretless-sting-p-bass.html

[DunRockin]

Thanks for that, but I'm pretty sure these strings on my bass can't be D'Addarios because mine have uncoloured ballends.
As it stands Ernies look the most likely contenders so far.

[StringPing.com]

[quote name='DunRockin' timestamp='1416376086' post='2609495']
Thanks for that, but I'm pretty sure these strings on my bass can't be D'Addarios because mine have uncoloured ballends.
As it stands Ernies look the most likely contenders so far.
[/quote]

Ah yes! Ernie Ball are one of the big brands that don't do anything with the ball-ends these days. Rotosound have started do Red White and Blue, in a Union flag kind of arrangement. Although Rotosound used to do plain ball-ends (and some of their strings haven't made the move, yet), so I suppose it's possible that they're Rotosounds. I know they come in Green, but apparently these are Rotosound.

[skej21]

[quote name='StringPing.com' timestamp='1416307630' post='2608812']


D'Addario do have coloured ball ends, but some of their strings do have silked ends. These are D'Addario Chromes, apparently.



Does that look similar? Here's a link - in one of the pictures we can see the coloured ball ends on the back of the bass - http://antebelluminstruments.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/c20022013-hot-rod-fretless-sting-p-bass.html
[/quote]

They also don't fit on the bass! What's that all about?! Surely you'd notice and take them back BEFORE fitting them?

[bigd1]

This may seem a silly question but why does it matter. You say your not used to flats, all flats are smooth that's why they are called flats. The colour of the silk will make no difference at all to string performance. Just buy a good make, I use la Bella but EB, roto or whatever as your first set would be fine.
once you go to the flat side, you can never, never go back

[StringPing.com]

[quote name='skej21' timestamp='1416392492' post='2609625']
They also don't fit on the bass! What's that all about?! Surely you'd notice and take them back BEFORE fitting them?
[/quote]

Yeah, the owner actually does apologise to everyone for breaking rule number 1 - Buy strings that fit!

[quote name='bigd1' timestamp='1416392690' post='2609627']
This may seem a silly question but why does it matter. You say your not used to flats, all flats are smooth that's why they are called flats. The colour of the silk will make no difference at all to string performance. Just buy a good make, I use la Bella but EB, roto or whatever as your first set would be fine.
once you go to the flat side, you can never, never go back
[/quote]

I've heard of this a few times now - somebody buys a bass with a set of strings on it that they really like, but they have no idea what make they are. If you're lucky, you might still be able to get in touch with the previous owner. If you're unlucky, he can't remember what strings they are

But, I agree with you - when it comes to restringing, just buy a good set (that fits ) from a good brand. They all have their own unique tone and feel, but if you don't know much about them, you can't really go wrong with just buying from a good brand, or what the people of BassChat recommend (which is invariably La Bella or Thomastik Infeld ).

[DunRockin]

@Stringping. Arggh. So they actually [i]could be [/i](older) Rotos with that dark blue silk? As I mentioned in the first post these mystery strings are clearly nicely low tensioned, whereas the general forum wisdom suggests Rotos are one of the tediously higher tensioned brands. (The only flats I've tried were some neck bending Fenders. No amount of long term, subtle truss rod adjusting has ever returned the JB neck to the perfect state I'd had it in previously )
Either way I think Ernies are the best choice after the much appreciated replies here.

@bigd1 As mentioned again, here and in the orig post, the low tension, neck friendly playability aspect of these strings was important. And as I understand it not all flats are texturally the same (the reason I chose the term 'sheer' in my orig description) and the windings differ - again, why I mentioned their closeness on these particular strings.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for their help. I'll try some Ernies.
Cheers, all.

[Dan Dare]

If you like flats, try Thomastik. Expensive, but nice. Use them on my fiddle, too and just converted to them on the bass.