Wound strings wear through quickly

Hi all, I would just like to hear from others about string wear. I have played guitar for many years but am fairly new to ukes. I have a Lanikai LU21T and the wound third kept wearing out at the second fret, so I switched from GHS to Aquila nylgut strings and get much better sound and longevity. I just bought a Pono KT-1 with Ko`olau gold strings and both the wound strings are worn through at the second fret after only six weeks. Is this normal? Or should I have changed them sooner? On my acoustic guitar the strings would sound dead long before they wore out. I like the low-G sound of the Pono, do they make nyglut strings for low-G tenor? Also I'm getting some mild sitar-like buzzing on the Pono now but I think it's just the strings, once I change them I hope it goes away.

Not sure how much playing time your six weeks represents, but typically that's time to change strings. Folks that play their guitars a lot change 'em every week. I would think the worn out ones would be an indicator to you.

Whew! Seemed kinda soon to me, but I must admit I'm playing ukulele a LOT more that I ever played my guitar, so just wanted to make sure I was not overdoing it. Getting new strings tonight after work!

From my experience, wound strings do wear really quickly. The low G from my Aquila set flattened out wherever it touched the frets within an hour, and by the next day it was already starting to come unravelled. Part of it might be because I beat the crap out of my strings.

Worth makes a low G set that's all plain, non-wound strings. I need to give it a try.

haole said:

From my experience, wound strings do wear really quickly. The low G from my Aquila set flattened out wherever it touched the frets within an hour, and by the next day it was already starting to come unravelled. Part of it might be because I beat the crap out of my strings.

Worth makes a low G set that's all plain, non-wound strings. I need to give it a try.

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I use D'addario J4804's for a wound low g on my tenors. No probs with them unravelling or flattening.

deach said:

I use D'addario J4804's for a wound low g on my tenors. No probs with them unravelling or flattening.

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orly? i wana try thoze.

my aquila low g is starting to become flat as well

haole said:

From my experience, wound strings do wear really quickly. The low G from my Aquila set flattened out wherever it touched the frets within an hour, and by the next day it was already starting to come unravelled. Part of it might be because I beat the crap out of my strings.

Worth makes a low G set that's all plain, non-wound strings. I need to give it a try.

Click to expand...

Do they make these for concerts? The Aquilla low g seems much louder than the nyguts.

I got some new Aquila low-G tenor strings last night. The Ko'olau gold strings I had on before had two wound strings, and on the Aquila set only the low G is wound. I noticed that the Nylgut C string is really fat, and while this was no problem for my Lanikai tenor, the Pono seemed like the channel was too small for it. I did not want to bore it out though, so I just went with it and it seems fine under tension. Sounds great too!

FYI I asked about a non-wound low-G tenor set of strings and was told that the low G would be too fat to really work, and now I believe it. I see from the above post that Worth makes such a set, but I think the gauge would be really thick and I am sure I would have to file out the nut on my Pono for those. I'll see how these go first, and if they die soon I'll try Deach's D'Addarios. Funny, I use D'Addarios on my acoustic guitar, so maybe that would have avoided this whole thread in the first place!

Thanks for all the comments