Low G: Nylon vos Wound Any Impressions

eyedoc

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Hi,
New to the forum, so this may be a repeat thread. Who likes the wound vs. they Nylon low G and why?
Thanks,
Ron
 
I hate the wound low G. I hate it because the texture is so different. I can't get over that. And I can't get over that squeaky sound it makes when I transition between frets. Also, it seems very much louder than the other strings. I can't say that I exhausted the choices in wound strings; maybe there's one out there that isn't so bad. However, that's my limited experience.
 
All depends on how you play and what strings you use. Used to be wound low-Gs sucked. These days there are some really nice options. Nice enough that I've thought about switching from nylon. From a tension and pitch point of view, a wound string is quite superior. But you can beat the feel of an all-nylon set.
 
I tried a wound low G early in my ukulele life. Like Ripock, I hated it. Didn't like the feel, didn't like the zzzzzzzzzzzzzz sound. So, I abandoned low G for a year or so. Then, wanting to try some transcriptions that required low G, I tried a few non-wound ones. I didn't like them and went back to wound. Turned out I love the wound low G.
Brad may be right, that the available strings are better than ones from years ago. In my case, I think it was simply that my skills had gotten me beyond making so much noise when fretting. Also, I realized guitarists, all guitarists, deal with this every day. So, I got over it.
 
Got a Low G set (3 & 4 wound, 1 & 2 unwound) from Chuck Moore. I'll not use anything else unless Chuck says he's found something better.
 
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thanks!
I am also told the "Fremont Soloist" is a great wound G. I have a couple on order.
As a classical guitarist, I'm used to the squeaks, I guess....
Ron
 
Polished wounds are the way to go for wound, but I have been using Living Waters or Latitude 24 unwound low g’s.
 
I play with a wound G(Fremont Soloist) no squeak as it’s a polished string. To avoid it overwhelming the other strings it needs to be combined with a wound C also. I prefer nylon to fluorocarbon strings for E and A and I use D’Addario black nylon. Beau Hannam custom Selmer Macaferri Tenor.
 
I prefer wound for low G. Nylons sound too thuddy to me and I don't like how fat they feel. My go-to strings for low G are Fremont Soloist and Southcoast wound sets.
 
Got a Low G set (3 & 4 wound, 1 & 2 unwound) from Chuck Moore. I'll not use anything else unless Chuck says he's found something better.

Last I heard he was using Thomas-Inkfield strings for the basses. The Ukulele Site was selling them for a while. Just FYI for those interested.
 
Charlie Fukuba, builder of I'iwi ukulele, also uses Thomastik-Infeld wound strings for the basses and flourocarbons for the trebles. It sounds good on my I'iwi.
 
Wound strings never seem to last long for me, so I stick
with plain nylon/fluorocarbon and that last as long as the
rest of the set!
 
I prefer wound for low G. Nylons sound too thuddy to me and I don't like how fat they feel. My go-to strings for low G are Fremont Soloist and Southcoast wound sets.

This, this and this. I could not agree more.

"eyedoc" because you are a guitar player and are comfortable with wound string your choice of Fremont Soloist is perfect. They are the gold standard for a low G string. I go one step further and use a wound C string as well, much better transistion. Either Thomastik CF 27 or D'Addario Silver Wound NYL028W
 
Wound strings never seem to last long for me, so I stick
with plain nylon/fluorocarbon and that last as long as the
rest of the set!

+1 for this, wound strings don't seem to last very long
 
I guess I'm in the minority as I like wound nylon strings. I also like to hear the finger "whosh" from time to time when playing. Probably stems from my guitar playing. I'm currently only baritone so my bottom two strings (D and G) are both wound. I like the balance it gives to the instrument having two wound and two plain nylon. I'm sure if I were playing for traditional ukulele I might feel different about the low G being wound. True that the wound strings wear out faster than the plain nylon - the price to pay :)
 
Like bsfloyd, my baritone is tuned in fifths, GDAE, but I could not stand a wound third string, even a flatwound Thomastik. That was a surprise, as I'd been using Thomastik flatwound steel strings happily for many years. The zinging noise caused by my right hand fingers playing on upstrokes was just too much for me, as it was a blatant and obvious-sounding noise in transition from the very quiet upper non-wound strings. So I switched to fluorocarbon 3rd (thanks to Seaguar) and couldn't be happier with the improvement in sound. Playing the first string, mostly with my fleshier thumb, was not nearly as bad sounding, and besides, it's a moot point since where are you going to find a non-wound string to tune that low? So I use the lowest Thomastik one for that. Likewise on my viola-tuned tenor, I use three fluorocarbons and one Thomastik flatwound.

bratsche
 
I don't like wound low G. I don't like the way they wear the frets quicker than the flurocarbs do.
 
[...]

I haven't noticed wear on my frets due to wound strings, only how quickly typical low-G strings in stock sets wear out, particularly the Aquilas and Martins. The Soloist and CF30 wear much longer than standard wound strings.

A wound G is the only one that ever wore my frets. I have a pretty light touch on the left hand and the other strings never hurt the frets. I bend strings a lot and notice a catch on low G. Or rather I used to - I haven't used a wound string on uke for 5 or 6 years.
 
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