whistleman123
Well-known member
I like the look of the aiersi hollow body electric jazz uke. But I don't want to play steel strings. Can a steel string electric be strung with nylon strings and still work properly?
Aiersi hollow body electric
- Thread starter whistleman123
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Jim Hanks
Well-known member
Depends what you mean by "work" but the short answer is "no". For one thing, pickups for steel strings work on a completely different principle than nylon strings. Also the bridge is designed for ball end strings, not tied, lower tension probably wouldn't drive the top for acoustic tone, etc.
Agreed.
Kala makes an archtop ukulele with nylon strings.
https://kalabrand.com/collections/archtop-ukulele
Street price for those seems to be around $300...I've never played one, so have no idea what they sound or feel like.
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To expand on what Jim said...
Magnetic pickups will NOT work with nylon strings because the nylon-type strings do not create any disturbance in the magnetic field of these kinds of pickups, which is the ONLY way that they work as pickups.
Thus, you can only use steel strings with magnetic pickups.
However, there are at least a dozen companies that make an all-solid-body (like a slab of butcherblock, and mind you this is NOT the 'all-solid' wood type that refers to the tonewood that is basically a hollow box that is how 'acoustic' ukes are made) but as you are seeking like a Les Paul or Strat/Tele guitar, and nearly everywhere nylon-type strings are used with a pickup, it is some form of piezo (out of nearly a dozen variations of piezo pickup) and has been for nearly 50 years now.
