Nylon folk strings

[Mark Schmieder]

I've been curious about these for some time, but wasn't sure how they'd sound. Last night, I went to a furniture store run by an Egyptian man who plays oud and guitar, and he played me a song he had written, using his own unique playing style. I noticed he had nylon strings on his dreadnought. He doesn't remember what he bought, but the only ones I'm aware of (with ball ends) are the John Pearse-specced set from Thomastik.

 

The sound was sweet, a bit bright (but not harsh), warm, articulate, and extremely well-balanced -- especially considering how boomy rosewood dreadnoughts can be.

 

Now I have stronger motivation to give this a try. I would say that the nylon strings had a bigger impact on the sound than the body size, shape, or woods. I did not expect this.

[KuruPrionz]

I'm not up on who makes ball end nylon strings currently, they were pretty popular a few decades ago.

I love the tone of nylon strings, they have a rich warmth that is difficult to find in steel strings, at least I never seem to get there.

 

I love steel strings too, both have their place. I've owned nylon string guitars of one sort or another my whole life.

The biggest problem with adapting them to steel string guitars is the tuner posts. The larger posts typical to classical guitars do work better with the nylon strings, it's easy to get too many wraps on a set of steel string tuners.

 

That said, I put steel string tuners on my Boucher banjo kit that I build. It came with cello pegs and I just didn't have faith in those holding tune or the proper tools to get a perfect fit. That's another thing entirely, a fretless long scale 5 string banjer.

[Mark Schmieder]

It turns out that Ernie Ball and D'addario also make such strings, and as his three top strings were black and I think the bottom ones looked like phosphor bronze (not silver), probably they are this set from D'addario that I had no prior knowledge of:

 

https://www.stringsandbeyond.com/daddario-folk-guitar-strings-ej34-black-80-20-bronze.html

 

Note that D'addario makes two other sets as well, that are slightly different:

 

https://www.stringsandbeyond.com/daddario-folk-guitar-strings-ej33-clear-80-20-bronze.html

 

https://www.stringsandbeyond.com/daddario-folk-guitar-strings-ej32-black-silver.html

 

This is the Ernie Ball set:

 

https://www.stringsandbeyond.com/eb-2069.html

 

The John Pearse set from Thomastik-Infeld is the outlier in terms of being rope core and lighter gauge:

 

https://www.stringsandbeyond.com/thomastik-john-pearse-folk.html

 

Are they ball end or loop end? My impression is that they are the opposite of the other strings, being more folk-like for classical guitars as opposed to more classical-like for folk guitars.

 

UPDATE: The juststrrings site has far more accurate descriptions of the John Pearse set, which 100% contradict with what is said at Strings and Beyond!

 

https://www.juststrings.com/jps-tho.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=jps-tho#reviews

 

So I think maybe these are the set that are most oriented towards being used on folk guitars.

[Mark Schmieder]

The John Pearse strings are indeed for classical guitars or flamenco guitars and are preferred by the Brasilian players, who tend to use nylon guitars for jazz and other genres and like a somewhat bright sound.

 

I see mixed reviews of the D'addario sets, and they've been around for a few years. The Ernie Ball set may be a better bet, but I'm not sure which guitar I'd try them on as I mostly have perfect matches at this point.

[KuruPrionz]

I have the next model Yamaha under the one Gabriella is playing in this video, all solid woods and ebony fretboard.

 

 

I like the D"Addario Pro Arte Extra Hard Tension on that guitar, it sounds great plugged straight in. Definitely not ball ends, I am no purist so maybe I would like the ball ends. Certainly faster to restring.

[Larryz]

I like D'Addario Pro Arte EJ46LP Hard Tension Lightly Polished Silver Plated Clear Nylon LP Composites. The set comes with two 3rd strings one of which is a composite .037 which I do not care for. The other is clear nylon .0410 which is the normal 3rd string that I like better than the new space age material. The wound strings are not as bright unplugged as they are polished but sound great plugged in. The polishing reduces squeak for recording purposes and for avoiding the squeak that drives me nuts using the other brands. You have to learn to tie them on as they are not ball ends. It's not a hard thing to learn and it goes very fast. You might save a few minutes (no more than 6 LoL!) using ball ends during string changes. I would think the string contact with the wooden bridge would produce a more classical guitar sound than the ball ends but since I never use them, can't say for sure. I can say I love the polished strings!

[Caevan O’Shite]

Martin also has ball-end nylon classical string-sets. I tried them years ago on a cheaply made '50s or '60s vintage Silvertone "classical" guitar; they were good quality overall- but on that guitar at least, the D'Addario Pro Arte tie-on Classical Guitar Strings just had a better, richer, more complex tone.

 

Now, that may have been, in part, due to the fact that I was able to get a slightly better, steeper break-angle over the bridge the way I tied the Pro Arte strings on, experimenting with knot techniques. That guitar had a terribly shallow tie-bar/string-holes/bridge design, and was a pretty lacking guitar all-around; I used "high tension" sets from both Martin and D'Addario, if I recall correctly, to get the most out of it.

 

I found that I really enjoyed playing slide and fretted on it in Open-G6 Tuning! I'd posted about it here before... What a gas! What a fat, full, round tone! Super cool for fretting-behind-the-slide moves (my concave/flared Dunlop Harris Slide worked best for that). Instant Hawaiian/Western-Swing/Sponge-Bob, spontaneously morphing into quasi New-Age modal/suspended sounding moves turning on a dime! Too cool! I just dreamily meandered about in open-string-ring fingerstyle mystery-chord Heaven for hours...

[Mark Schmieder]

But there's a difference between ball-end classical strings and nylon strings designed for folk guitars. Mostly in the tension and gauge of the top three strings.

 

Matters get confused by the vendors themselves, who seem to be marketing some of their sets to both crowds!

[KuruPrionz]

Most definitely a potentially confusing topic. Larryz mentions a wound G string. I seem to remember a fully wound set of nylon strings but that was decades ago.

 

Just more guitar crazy world! And we are all different, I like the heavier strings for nylon, others dislike them. A friend has an old nylon string that somehow stays functional that his mom gave him. The label is dated from the 1930's.

He keeps light strings on it and I approve, I am not sure why it hasn't exploded yet! A beater but it has lots of stories in it.

[Larryz]

Kuru/Mark, slight error I need to correct if I caused any confusion in the D'Addario EJ46 LP set...I mentioned a composite .037 3rd G string and a normal clear nylon .0410 3rd G string. Neither of them are wound. Only the top 3 polished strings are wound. The 3 unwound string gauges and tensions are:

 

3rd string composite .037 13.1 lbs.

3rd string nylon .0410 12.4 lbs

2nd string nylon .0327 12.0 lbs.

1st string nylon .0285 15.8 lbs.

 

The 4th 5th and 6th strings have a Lightly Polished Silverplated winding.

 

ps. Juststrings.com has a very good selection of Ball End sets by: Earnie Ball, Martin, GHS, SIT, Fender, John Pearse and La Bella, all at reasonable prices.

[Mark Schmieder]

Larry, thanks for pointing out a few others I didn't know about, that address the desire for nylon strings on flat-top folk guitars. I'll check those out. If only I had an acoustic guitar with me on this coast; they all got left behind when I drove 3000 miles to my new job a couple of weeks ago. I have so many acoustics by now, that I hesitate to buy another -- especially as the only one I would even consider is a Lowden O-23 (hard to find in USA).

 

I guess one option is to buy a bang-for-buck beater in the under $700 range that is pretty good even if not in the same league as the ones I left behind in CA. For instance, something by Recording King. I would think the nylon strings would work best on the smaller parlor size or concert size guitars anyway, and possibly on 12-fret models vs. 14-fretters?

[Mark Schmieder]

https://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessories/fender-100-clear-silver-nylon-classical-guitar-strings--tie-end

 

https://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessories/fender-130-clear-silver-classical-nylon-guitar-strings--ball-end

 

Surprised to see that Fender also makes these, but their tensions indicate they are for classical guitar bodies vs. folk guitars.

[Mark Schmieder]

https://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessories/labella-830-folksinger-nylon-guitar-strings

 

The La Bella set does seem oriented towards folk guitars, and gets some bad reviews but La Bella strings are polarizing in general and many people don't realize they are partially at fault (read the instructions!).

 

https://www.juststrings.com/lab-830.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=lab-830

 

One reviewer says that Willie Nelson used these for 15 years or more.

 

https://www.juststrings.com/lab-840.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=lab-840

 

No reviews of the alternate set. I've seen elsewhere that silver is generally preferred to 80/20, when paired with nylon treble strings.

[Mark Schmieder]

https://www.juststrings.com/sit-sch102b.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=sit-sch102b

 

The S.I.T. set seems to be designed for classical guitars vs. folk guitars.

[Mark Schmieder]

https://www.juststrings.com/cfm-m-160.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=cfm-m-160

 

https://www.juststrings.com/cfm-m-260.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=cfm-m-260

 

Reading the reviews, it now becomes clear that the many complaints of ball end nylon strings by other brands, are not brand-specific QC issues but rather the nature of the beast, as it is said that ball ends on nylon strings lead to breakage and other issues way more frequently than do loop ends.

 

So it seems the ball ends are just for convenience, except in the case where the strings are specifically designed to allow a folk guitar to get into different sonic territory.

[Mark Schmieder]

https://www.juststrings.com/ghs-2050w.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=ghs-2050w

 

https://www.juststrings.com/ghs-2000.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=ghs-2000#reviews

 

I now think the GHS set may be what the guy had on his dreadnought the other night.

 

https://www.juststrings.com/jps-tho.html?cmp=nextopia&kw=jps-tho#reviews

 

I'm kind of inclined towards the John Pearse set if I give one a try, but I'm getting confused by now over which sets are for classical guitars vs. folk guitars: the ones with heavy gauges for the top three strings, or the ones with gauges closer to typical folk strings. The tension matters more, of course, so it it likely more relevant which ones have a rope core design (like many classical strings).

 

I have updated my earlier post, as the Just Strings write-up is 100% contradictory with what is said at the Strings and Beyond site, where it is stated that the Pearse set is rope core (it is not!). I have found Just Strings to generally be the most trustworthy strings site for specs, but they don't carry some of the oddball sets that I need for my unusual instruments.

 

If I buy a beater guitar for here, it might be the Gretsch Rancher, as I have liked those when I try them in stores and they sound a bit different from other acoustics as well as being said to do well in the studio. The Jim Dandy (parlor) and New Yorker (archtop) models are nice as well.

[Larryz]

Mark, I have never used ball ends so I have very little experience with them and/or folk guitars. But, I know just strings is a great place to buy regular sets and make your own custom sets as they also sell singles in loop ends and steel strings. They also have lots of info on each set as far as tension and gauges, ball and loop ends, etc. Their only down side is it costs about $7 bucks for shipping and handling. If you order 5 or more sets at a time (and I order 5 or more singles) it only adds a buck or so to the cost of each set. The prices are low enough so that they stay competitive. Strings and Beyond is also a good outfit. Good hunting and I think those John Pearse strings are going to work for you. Sweetwater used to ship a single set of strings for free so their prices were hard to beat if you only want one set of strings.

[CEB]

Never gave a thought about folk strings. I guess I just thought they were classical strings for people that didn"t know how to tie strings. ð

 

I"ve always used High Tension for on my Gipsy Kings. I have one classical guitar that is naturally not loud and I use Pro Arte high tension. My good classical I use Normal Tension Savarez. I like they feel if high tension especially on picado but higher tension strings get louder but seem duller sounding. Maybe it"s my imagination. My Gipsy Kings is a ridiculously bright guitar anyway and it"s a Flamenco guitar so it works.

 

I was a longtime Savarez and Augustines guy but I"m liking what D"Addario has been doing lately.

[Caevan O’Shite]

'Dumb Questions"- Are these the same kind of strings that were sometimes called "Silk & Steel" strings?

 

Do these have nylon plain/unwound trebles?

 

Are the "rope cores" mentioned above similar to typical Classical Guitar strings?

 

These all lie within a wing of guitar that I've very little knowledge or experience in...

[KuruPrionz]

'Dumb Questions"- Are these the same kind of strings that were sometimes called "Silk & Steel" strings?

 

Do these have nylon plain/unwound trebles?

 

Are the "rope cores" mentioned above similar to typical Classical Guitar strings?

 

These all lie within a wing of guitar that I've very little knowledge or experience in...

 

Silk and steel strings are typically a lighter gauge acoustic set with a wire core, a silk wrap and then a steel wrap. They are easy on the fingers and have a smooth tone but not like nylon strings.

I used to use them long ago.

 

Rope core strings are a style of strings used for nylon (formerly gut) string instruments. Instead of a twisted core, they have a braided one. Seems like a workable idea to me.

I've never tried them, at least that I know of anyway. People like them or they would go away.

[Caevan O’Shite]

Silk and steel strings are typically a lighter gauge acoustic set with a wire core, a silk wrap and then a steel wrap. They are easy on the fingers and have a smooth tone but not like nylon strings.

 

I kinda thought so...

 

Rope core strings are a style of strings used for nylon (formerly gut) string instruments. Instead of a twisted core, they have a braided one. Seems like a workable idea to me.

I've never tried them, at least that I know of anyway. People like them or they would go away.

 

I think that Thomastik-Infeld has made more than one type/set of strings with a "woven"/"rope" core- including some for Classical guitars with woven steel rope cores (those may no longer be in production).

 

I have not tried any of them, but I'd be very, very curious to try; all the more reason to add a Classical style guitar and other acoustic variations to my small but gradually growing collection...

[hurricane hugo]

[font:Verdana]I used to use them lots, but the local shops stopped carrying them for a while. I've noticed that my FLMS has them again, so I'm gonna start up with them again as soon as I get my old nylon string guitar up and running again.[/font]

[KuruPrionz]

 

I have not tried any of them, but I'd be very, very curious to try; all the more reason to add a Classical style guitar and other acoustic variations to my small but gradually growing collection...

 

A nylon string guitar is a must have around here. I've owned a fair number of them, mostly not notable but decent. A few years back I sold our lead singer a Goya "classical" guitar made in Sweden that is really nice. Salvation Army find - $75 with a flimsy case. It's nothing fancy but it plays and sounds good. I still enjoy visiting it from time to time.

 

I do love a full-on classical guitar but I prefer a hybrid acoustic electric with a cutaway. Still, I am picky about my nylon string choices. I had a Rainsong WS9000 and I just couldn't love it because the neck was 1.75" at the nut and the fretboard was not flat but had a radius on it. It found somebody else to love it and I still have mixed feelings about selling it but I just couldn't resolve keeping it. The one I have now seems to be a keeper for me, I have no desire to get a different one.

It's a Yamaha NCX1200R - at one point in time Yamaha made signature models for Rodriego y Gabrielle and this one is Gabrielle's signature model but the next one under the most expensive, top of the line model. Still, it has all solid woods, a spruce top, rosewood back and sides, mahogany neck with ebony fretboard and bridge so it's pretty deluxe and essentially flawless. It wasn't cheap either, like new with case I paid $700 and shipping for a returned guitar.

The pickup sounds great, even records well directly. I did lower the saddle (bone) for my preferred action and I put D'Addario Pro Arte extra hard tension strings on it, they seem to belong there.

 

Fingerpicking a nylon string guitar with a wide fretboard is profoundly different than fingerpicking a steel string guitar. I need both in my world.

[Larryz]

'Dumb Questions"- Are these the same kind of strings that were sometimes called "Silk & Steel" strings?

 

Do these have nylon plain/unwound trebles?

 

Are the "rope cores" mentioned above similar to typical Classical Guitar strings?

 

These all lie within a wing of guitar that I've very little knowledge or experience in...

 

Normally the 3 basses are nylon core with either 99% silver winding or silver plated copper winding. The 3 trebles plain/unwound are clear nylon with no squeak. The trebles will last a very long time whereas the basses windings will wear out much sooner and will let you know when it's time to change strings. The 99% silver is supposed to reduce squeak and the silver plated are supposed to get better tone. I run sliver plated polished basses which do get less squeak. I'm not familiar with rope cores. My cores are a composite nylon. It takes about a week for the plain strings to stretch in and only a couple of days for the basses to stretch in. You can now order them in 1/2 sets bass or treble, so I would order 1/2 sets in basses at juststrings.com and a full set if/when the trebles ever wear out LoL!

[Winston Psmith]

I use Silk-&-Steel strings in my Acoustics and A/E Guitars, because I like the sound and the feel of them; a little warmer, a little softer, at least IMHO.

 

I'm familiar with Ball-End Nylon Folk Strings, I used to sell a lot of them to people who didn't want to learn how to tie off Nylon Strings at the Bridge; they're definitely not made for Steel-String Guitars.

 

The two questions that come to me as I read through this thread: For one, wouldn't your average set of Nylon Strings be too thick to sit properly in a Nut cut for Steel Strings, and least your 1st, 2nd & 3rd strings? For another, I can't see the Nylon strings coming close to the tension of even a light .011-.052 string set? It seems that would affect the action & intonation, and all manner of structural or design issues.

[KuruPrionz]

The two questions that come to me as I read through this thread: For one, wouldn't your average set of Nylon Strings be too thick to sit properly in a Nut cut for Steel Strings, and least your 1st, 2nd & 3rd strings? For another, I can't see the Nylon strings coming close to the tension of even a light .011-.052 string set? It seems that would affect the action & intonation, and all manner of structural or design issues.

 

 

Yes on the nut slots. Easily fixed, needle files are not expensive.

You are correct about the difference in tension. When I was a busy guitar tech I had a couple of customers come in with nylon string guitars that they'd put steel strings on.

The lucky one had the bridge torn off. I could sort of fix that. It wasn't pretty but it held up ok.

The unlucky one had a less expensive "classical" guitar with the bridge held in place with two bolts. The neck was warped, the top was warped and the guitar was COREVOI - Cost of repair exceeds value of instrument.

 

Steel strings in general are much higher tension than nylon strings.

Nylon is pretty forgiving and consistent about intonation but you would probably hear some discrepancies up the neck.

I don't mess about with such things, steel strings on steel string guitars and nylon on nylon. The tuners for steel strings aren't great for tuning nylon for one of many reasons. They don't sound as good either, a guitar made for nylon strings with nylon strings on it should sound much better, a lighter build.

[Winston Psmith]

I would never think of putting Steel Strings on a Nylon-String Instrument, unless I wanted to see how long it took to come apart!!! I'm amazed the top didn't come off the Guitar with the bolt-on bridge?

 

OTOH, I can't really see trying to convert a Steel-String Guitar to play with Nylon strings? There are Nylon-String Guitars with narrow necks and cutaways, that are very well suited for Steel-String players, if you're looking for the Nylon sound and feel.

[KuruPrionz]

I'm amazed the top didn't come off the Guitar with the bolt-on bridge?

 

 

Sadly, not everybody understands guitars or even simple physics. The top was hopelessly warped, it was a hopelessly toneless plywood top anyway.

I told them I would not fix it since they could buy a much better guitar for the same as I would have charged to fix their piece of crap.

 

They left it, I took the tuners off for spares and tossed it out, hopeless.

[Mark Schmieder]

No, a folk guitar with nylon strings sounds quite different from a classical guitar or flamenco guitar with nylon strings, so it's still a flavour I am curious about, as I don't want to duplicate my existing concert guitar collection here on the east coast and would rather get something that isn't redundant. But it is indeed possible that the narrower neck of a folk guitar would be less conducive to nylon string playing, just as with 'ukuleles, where pro models tend to have different neck widths than intermediate ones.

 

I don't think I'll be doing this any time soon though. Instead, I've ordered some 80/20 strings (I currently have none) for an Epiphone Frontier acoustic guitar that I ordered to compensate for not having been able to fit any in my car on my cross-country drive. The Frontier sounds great and doesn't seem redundant in my collection at all. But I am going to need SOMETHING with nylon strings soon, as I will get to my bossa tunes for final guitar takes before long.

[KuruPrionz]

No, a folk guitar with nylon strings sounds quite different from a classical guitar or flamenco guitar with nylon strings, so it's still a flavour I am curious about, as I don't want to duplicate my existing concert guitar collection here on the east coast and would rather get something that isn't redundant. But it is indeed possible that the narrower neck of a folk guitar would be less conducive to nylon string playing, just as with 'ukuleles, where pro models tend to have different neck widths than intermediate ones.

 

I don't think I'll be doing this any time soon though. Instead, I've ordered some 80/20 strings (I currently have none) for an Epiphone Frontier acoustic guitar that I ordered to compensate for not having been able to fit any in my car on my cross-country drive. The Frontier sounds great and doesn't seem redundant in my collection at all. But I am going to need SOMETHING with nylon strings soon, as I will get to my bossa tunes for final guitar takes before long.

 

My experience is that nylon strings generally need a bit higher action than steel strings and a slimmer neck makes it much more difficult to avoid your fingers colliding with nearby strings. I am 6'2"+ so my fingers are pretty large. The entire reason I sold my Rainsong WS9000 nylon string was that the neck was 1 3/4" wide at the nut, which would be considered fairly wide for a steel string guitar. I had the action reasonably low for a nylon string and I just could not navigate that fretboard successfully with the nylon strings. The Yamaha nylon string guitar I have now has a 2" wide fretboard and I am much happier with it.