Is it possible that my uke's just not meant to bend?

Hi,

My ukulele is a Fender Tenor. So far the strings I've tried are Aquila, Hilo, Da'darrio, and Fremont. Even the easiest, the Fremonts, are a pain to bend. In contrast, my soprano ukulele is very easy to bend on. I know they're different string tensions, but I've seen others bend on tenors with relative ease. Is it possible I just don't have a ukulele cut out for bending? Or something else?

Thanks!

Do a bunch of fingertip push-ups until you're strong enough to bend. until then, tune it down a step.

:shaka:If you tune down a half step then you are in Jimi Hendrix/Stevie Ray Vaughan ukulele tuning.


Seriously, tune it down a half step and work on bends until your finger strength builds up. Soon you should be able to bend alright in standard tuning.

Truth is, some guitars are more difficult to bend on than others for completely unknown reasons - even the same model with the same brand and gauge of strings will bend differently. I suppose the same could be true of ukes. At the same time, tenors are quite a bit harder to bend on than sopranos in my experience.

deach said:

Do a bunch of fingertip push-ups until you're strong enough to bend. until then, tune it down a step.

Click to expand...

Deach congrats on your 6000th post!


Jack

Found this website on ukulele string tensions

Did a quick google search and found this website that has some numbers regarding the string tensions on an ukulele:

ukulele string tensions and scale lengths

If those numbers are correct, the tenor ukulele has almost twice the cumulative string tension over a soprano. So it is not surprising that the tenor is much harder to bend.