I'd like to confirm what Inksplosive AL has said and add the following...
I've had a few REDS snap on me, DESPITE very closely following all the directions from Mimmo,
AND smoothing out the nut slots,
AND smoothing the zero fret on my tenor Fluke with micromesh 4000 grit to remove any burrs,
AND even also using a Q-tip to add some vaseline petroleum jelly in front of, and inside the grooves of the nut slots,
only to later have them pop at the string slot that goes into the saddle, that is
...
UNTIL I started using an 'Ashley's Stopper Knot' (seen on the Mya Moe web site) instead of an double-overhand knot, but alas, a fresh set of REDS seem to have high enough tension to snap anyway, so I TUNED DOWN from re-entrant G-C-E-A to F-Bb-D-G, and lo and behold, 3 months now, with an hr of daily play and the strings have not snapped.
Happy side effect is that tuning down a step, there is significantly greater sustain. I have all my tenors now tuned down to F-Bb-D-G...
As far as alternatives, of the 25 or so different strings sets I have tried, I've come to prefer the Oasis bright high-G sets for the fluorocarbon type, and for the following reasons:
- Better/balanced tension and sound to my ear than the Martin M600 type
- Lower cost for 2 sets of strings than Worth Clears, at VERY similar, feel and tone in 63" length that you can cut down for 2 sets for tenor
- Tone/feel/tension very close to Living Water tenor and concert sets, but again, 2 sets of Oasis are cheaper (~$10) than Living Waters from Uke Republic for ~$12 for a SINGLE set
When you have more than 10 ukes to restring over time, you start to become concerned about the pricing.
So far, my personal ranking is:
- Aquila REDS tuned down as per above for certain tenors
- Oasis bright high G for certain tenors
- Worth Browns with Fremont Soloist low-g on baritone for a sweet warm tone
- Fremont Blacklines MEDIUM tension on concert Flea, as Aquila REDS were starting to chew up the plastic fretboard
All of the above may change over time, as once upon a time, I was in love with Worth Browns on all my ukes, but once I grew out my nails enough to make a difference (and it made a BIG positive difference to me), the strings ALL sounded VERY different to my ear.
Without fingernails, it's as if you are only getting about 70% of the possible tonal energy of the strings, and with fingernails, you can get better articulation and 'attack' for single notes when finger-picking, that is simply not available to you when you play with fleshy fingertips. So this may be something to consider with all the advice you might receive in this thread.
Also, maybe it's just me, but I've found that the more you PLAY the Aquila REDS, and up the fretboard, the 'papery' feel and slight scratchiness from your fretting hand decreases over time, as the strings seem to develop a smoother surface from continued use, almost a shiny, or sheen surface - and I am not sure if this is due to friction from callused fingertips, or from skin oils from the fingertips, but it seems like an 'improvement' that comes only from continued use over time.
Maybe many folks have popped a string or two and abandoned the REDS before having enough hours of play time for the string surface to change to become smoother?
In another thread, someone mentioned about wanting to be able to buy SINGLES of the REDS, and this would be awesome, yeah, I know it's 'ONLY' like $6 per set, but if you could buy a single string for $1.50, then you dont have to replace the whole set, or use a single string from a new set, and then that set is incomplete...
Kinda like years ago when I was really into playing my electric guitar every day, which I really liked having an 0.009" for my high E string, I'd always buy 3 or 4 extra 0.009's as singles because that was the string that always snapped, usually long before the rest of the set lost their tone...
Hopefully Mimmo will see these threads and do someting like this for us.
