Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Hi there,

recently i put on my 4001 TI Flats (the 334 model, with gauge 100), and i think they are very great sounding strings, i can obtain a tone very very close to classic Macca tone in Beatles albums.

Anyway i am kind of dissatisfied with the lack of presence of the E string, which in my opinion is not enough in tension to vibrate well. So i was looking for a set of strings with a lower gauge (like 095), but i saw that TI are making lower gauges only for super long scale (36 ") basses.

So i was wondering if there are other Low Tension sets of strings (Flats of course) which can be similar in sound to the TI (people already warned me against D'Ad and Pyramid cause they are rather high-tension) ...

Thank you

i am using a 95 gauge flatwound ghs string set on my danelectro bass-it has a nice feel and tension,and should work well for a 4000 series bass. now if we could convince maxima to start producing their flatwounds that rickenbacker used in the 60's-early 70's.........

I use a Chromes Super Soft set (40-60-75-95) that I replace the .060 D string with a .055 and get a similar feel to TI JFs on my Ricks. Nice balanced tone and feel to the strings.

I am confused, do you want more of less tension than it currently has (regarding the low E)? It seems like you want more tension but I'm not sure exactly.

If you want more, the D'Addario Chromes 40-60-80-100 set might be nice to try; it will have a little more tension but not that much. The difference is very little for the tension of the G but it would add 8-10 lbs to the D and A and 5 lbs to the E. You could try 40-55-75-100 or 40-55-75-95 a la Jeff as well and see if that works (the JPS Set will probably be the best for you according to my quick glance at the D'Addario tension database).

My personal favorite right now is LaBella Deep Talkin' Flats 43-60-82-104 set. A lot more balanced (and a bit more tension) than the TI JF344 set and many other sets out there. My opinion on the JF344 set is that the A and E tend to sound muddy and lack character, but the top two strings are okay.

If you are happy with everything on the TI JF344 set except the E string, similarly sized D'Addario Chrome strings will probably do the trick (in general a Chromes string compared to the same size TI flats is about 5 more pounds of tension per string, which is not that much). LaBella also makes a set of strings that is gauged 39-56-77-96, I bet they play very nicely and the tension can't be very high either. Don't let people tell you this brand or that brand makes high-tension strings... it's a function of the gauge, the core and the wrap material, and is rarely absolute. I can't speak for Pyramid, but LaBella and D'Addario strings are only high tension if you get medium-high gauges.

Great Explanation Josh, many thanks. You could write an "official thread" here on the forum on string gauge and tension and how to choose or compose a well balanced set of strings, i guess it could be useful for many people here.

Actually i'd like to have more tension on the E string, in my opinion TI are so low tension that the E string even if in tune, is still not vibrating well, but maybe it's due also to the fact that Rick basses have a lower scale than other basses.

Before TIs i used D'Ad Chromes (100 gauge) but i had to remove because the neck started to show some relief on my 4001. So on some posts on the official rick forum some people told me that D'Ad are rather High Tension and if my neck couldn't handle them it was better not to even think about Pyramids.

Anyway i think i'll give a try to a lower gauge of D'Ad Chromes, my experience is that they sound very bright for a flat set of strings.

As for the TIs sound muddy, i don't know how TI's behave on a 4003, but with my 4001 i have a sound very very close to the Macca.
Anyway i heard some people here and there that often to obtain a well balanced TI set you have to compose two or more set of the same gauge.

I had also strange behaviour with Pyarmid Gold : just yesterday i installed them on my P-Bass : the E string is almost mute, while the other three are a lot more ringing ... maybe it's hard to find a good set of flats ...

the unfortunate thing about pyramid (and ti) full scale bass string sets is each manufacturer only makes one gauge. the pyramid e string is notorious for being "dead" sounding,basically all fundamental and the pyramid set exerts a lot of pressure. OTTH, ti's are very low tension,so much so that they rarely seem to "work" all that well,again mostly the e and a strings,to get much of a lower end punch. jeff and joshua have done the work for us all,experimenting with various gauges to come up with what works well with rick basses,and their sonic results are available for all to hear. (they're good!) the only thing i can add is that to me,at least d'addario chromes tend to sound a bit clangy,which is not necessarily a bad thing with a rick bass,but i tend to go for a more traditional sound/feel with flats,and find the ghs strings fit the bill. i would think the labella set would be similar to these as well.

Umm i'll keep in mind to try GHS sooner or later.

Just to add a cent on TIs : in my case the A string is the only string of the set which is good sounding, very fat with strong fundamental and a lot of harmonics. The E string at the beginning was all harmonics and very little fundamentals (sort of little flanger effect), with use has become less harmonics, a little more fundamental and the flanger effect kind of disappeared. The G and D strings are high volume but sound a little dead.

I'd like to try also to change the bridge with a hipshot (because of the plug-n playability) to se if a different adjustment for each string work better than with the standard bridge ...

One thing you can try is to just buy one of the "weak" strings through juststrings.com. Just a single string.

I do this occasionally just to try a new string and how it feels. I'll take the string I want to test off and put the new one on, leaving the other strings alone.

This allows me to compare how they sound too.

I recently replaced my XL Chromes on the 4003S/5 to Rotosound TruBass Black Nylons except I picked up the 6 string set (only $2 more at juststrings.com) and used the higher 5 strings which were more in line by guage to what Rickenbacker is selling for a 5'er. 50, 65, 75, 100, 115.

Stringing it this way has made it awfully slinky and gives it a lower tension feel.

Does anyone know of a way to directly measure the tension on a string while it's on an instrument?

Maybe I should ask, "Does anyone know of an easy way of measing tension?"

woodyng wrote:i am using a 95 gauge flatwound ghs string set on my danelectro bass-it has a nice feel and tension,and should work well for a 4000 series bass. now if we could convince maxima to start producing their flatwounds that rickenbacker used in the 60's-early 70's.........

Supposedly these are the reincarnation:
http://www.juststrings.com/optimaelectr ... uitar.html

woodyng wrote:the unfortunate thing about pyramid (and ti) full scale bass string sets is each manufacturer only makes one gauge. the pyramid e string is notorious for being "dead" sounding,basically all fundamental and the pyramid set exerts a lot of pressure.

I have Pyramids on my 75th DCM 4003 and they sound great. The string package lists five different gauge sets:

Heavy: 45-65-85-105
Medium: 40-60-80-100
Light: 40-60-75-95
Extra Light: 35-55-75-95
Super Light: 30-50-70-90

Tarrbot wrote:One thing you can try is to just buy one of the "weak" strings through juststrings.com. Just a single string.

you're right. but i find difficult to do a compare because the newer strings sounds differently anyway from the ones already installed on the bass.

johnallg wrote:Supposedly these are the reincarnation:
http://www.juststrings.com/optimaelectr ... uitar.html

how are they ? someone here ever tried optima ?

I have not tried them. I do have a set of NOS RIC/Maxima flats on my 2004 4003 and they are very smooth sounding, low tension, and give you a nice thump.

Tarrbot wrote:Does anyone know of a way to directly measure the tension on a string while it's on an instrument?
Maybe I should ask, "Does anyone know of an easy way of measing tension?"

I don't know how to measure the tension of the string itself, or how much it pulls on the neck. However, it is of course possible to measure the force is needed to bend a string a certain amount.

I've used a small digital scale and a little stick. Put bass up on its side, body resting on the flour, holding the neck over the scale. Put the stick on the scale and let middle of the string rest on top of the stick. Lower the neck down for the string to bend up against the next string, and read of the weight on the scale. Holding the bass by hand like this won't give an accurate reading, and the gap is not equal between all strings. There is more accurate way to do this (make something simple to use as a better ruler than string gap), but I find this quick and dirty method accurate and consistent enough for my purpose.

I put bass on one side and measure G D A stings, turn it over and measure E A D. Now I have a reading for G>D and D>G, D>A and A>D, A>E and E>A, which gives an indication of relative tension between each string. (If A>E greater than E>A then A string has more tension than E, and if D>A greater than A>D then G has even more tension etc.) The same measures for another set of strings give an indication of the relative difference in tension between the sets.

FretlessOnly wrote:

woodyng wrote:the unfortunate thing about pyramid (and ti) full scale bass string sets is each manufacturer only makes one gauge. the pyramid e string is notorious for being "dead" sounding,basically all fundamental and the pyramid set exerts a lot of pressure.

I have Pyramids on my 75th DCM 4003 and they sound great. The string package lists five different gauge sets:

Heavy: 45-65-85-105
Medium: 40-60-80-100
Light: 40-60-75-95
Extra Light: 35-55-75-95
Super Light: 30-50-70-90

The only readymade set I've seen is 40-55-75-105. Pyramid makes single strings in a variety of gauges though. The only place that I know selling single strings is:
http://saitenkatalog.de/shop1/index.php ... efc8cf47d9
However, the gauges may deviate quite a bit from what is ordered. For example, I have four .100 strings and they measure .96 .97 .98 .104. Don't know if labelling is done by Pyramid or at the shop, but two of them have .100 stamped onto the envelope, one has it handwritten, and one only has it on the price tag from the shop. These kinds of deviations may be a bit frustrating for meticulous people like me, when trying to find the correct gauges to get balanced tension on all string.

BTW: Got an old ’79 4001. It came with strings that look and feel like TIs - red silk, and the typical not completely smooth A and E. I measured them to 47-67-83-104. Due to the heavier gauge I was wondering if these are really TIs (did they previously make heavier strings?), or another make?