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Old 11-14-2010, 03:29 PM
harmonics101 harmonics101 is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: Eastern Washington - Idaho
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Default String Gauge : Guitar brands : Mediums : Lights : Martins : Gibsons

I just got my Gibson J200 out of storage after a 6 month hiatus of not playing. The darn thing needed a string change to sound better and i was never in the mood to changing the martin lights. The old ones were overplayed and had no intonation for nice sound.

Off the old strings and on with the new strings and i can't put the guitar down ! I think this is what happened to me the last time i picked it up was to change strings, play the snot out of the poor guitar (i do fingerstyle but the thing still gets a good workout with my right hand)

Lights don't seem to have a chance against me. I love the way they sound on my Gibsons and maybe thats why my Gibsons aren't played as often. Cuz I never have this complaint with mediums to deteriorate as fast as the lights seem to do. By the way i am a phosphour bronze person.

I do this with my Southern Jumbo as well. Get a string change and then play the thing until it dies, only motivated when a string change is an acceptable part of the routine.

Seems to be a hidden blessing with regards to my Martin guitars cuz wear and tear aren't the problem on my phosphour mediums on my Martins. I change the strings on my Martins when they start sounding crappy.

A bit of an edge on the Martins but there must be a reason i pickup that J200 and play the snot out of it for 7 days and back in the case she goes.

I guess i can call myself lucky !

Any comments, similar observations or any other constructive banter,

Harmonics101
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  #2  
Old 11-14-2010, 03:56 PM
Me&MyGuitar Me&MyGuitar is offline
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Location: Italy
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I was a "phopsphor-bronze person" until few weeks ago. But i was looking for a less dark sound from my HJ-38 Martin. I changed the pins from bone to brass and that was a good point but not yet enough; so i went for the 80/20 bronze strings (keep in mind that 80/20 bronze *is* brass) and, wow, the new sound finally came. Not too much, but right a bit clearer, just what i wanted (i believe that brass strings love brass pins). The bad to me is that, after so many PB brands and models trials and the ultimate choice of the John Pearse PB bluegrass gauge, now i am on the road again to the 80/20 bronze medium trials. I tried the D'Addario 85/15, good sound but poor harmonics; D'Addario 80/20, good sound but short lasting; GHS contact core, no way! ; John Pearse mediums, OK! ; Martin M150, quite good sound but nothing special.
Next trials will be:
Elixir 80/20 Bronze Ultra-Thin NANOWEB coating Medium
GHS IB 40 M Infinity Bronze (coated silver-plated copper)
Dogal V71 BRONZE 80/20 LINE ROUND WOUND
Thomastik SB113 Spectrum Bronze (nickel free) Medium
Martin MSP32FS SP Studio Performance Fingerstyle 80/20 Bronze M

Gosh!
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Old 11-14-2010, 11:53 PM
SiBarron SiBarron is offline
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Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Bristol, UK
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I was a Martin string man for a few years basically becasue they are the cheapest. I have sweaty hands and a new set would be dead at the end of a gig- in certain hot cases by the interval! So I would put on Martins (.13) because I could get them in bulk for £3.50 a pack. No point in getting anything more expensive because they would deaden in the same way. But then a few months back I thougt I may as well try Elixirs. I had held off from this because I figured that if the two high strings aren't coated whats the point of the coating on the other strings ie. the two top strings will deaden anyway and I'll have to replace no matter how good the other strings still sound.
Anyway that was the reasoning- but I decided to try them all the same. The first thing I noticed was that the strings sound so much better than Martin. I thought I wouldn't hear any difference but boy they sounded better. The second thing was that they didn't deaden. I got through gig after gig and they still sounded good. They are expensive- 3-4 times the price of the Martins but they last at least 3-4 times as long and sound better so it works out economically viable. The high strings aren't coated with a visable film but they have some sort of anti-rust treatment that keeps them as bright sounding as the coated lower strings. All in all I 'm very happy. I have tried the polys and the nanos and find both as good as each other, poly's feel slicker perhaps.
Sticking now with Elixirs, other coated strings are probably just as good. I think they are a boon for those like me with sweaty mitts
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