Strings for a Mainland

Sup guys. Hope all's well with the UU crowd today

My strings have a bit of life in 'em yet, but I figure it is drawing close to time to grab some new ones and I'd like to try something besides the Aquilas my uke came with (though I've been very satisfied with the sound).

So what strings would you say go well with a mahogany Mainland uke?

I tried many, many strings on my Mainland and settled on Martin Flourocarbons as they really made mine chime. worth clears were close second.

But that's just my opinion, you need to trust your own ears. Give those brands a try though.

See this thread FYI - Uke Strings . . .

Kanaka916.. the Human search engine..

Kanaka916 said:

See this thread FYI - Uke Strings . . .

Click to expand...

Go for Martin strings. M600 are really awesome, with a rich full tone and an exceptionnal playability for fingerstyle. Much better than Aquila strings IMHO.

I don't any reason to change from aquilas on my mainland or any of my other ukes for that matter.
Just me, but I think they sound great.

I've tried near a dozen strings on my Mainland mahogany concert and kept coming back to the Aquilas. My uke pretty mellow-sounding, and the Aquilas help brighten it up a bit and add just enough of the classic percussive ukulele bark. My second favorites so far are Southcoast medium regular strings. They're similar to Worth Clears (which are also great), but flourocarbon strings sound a bit too, erm, well-rounded and pretty for my taste. A weird criticism I know, but I like the attack on the Aquilas.

I just found the Aquilas a bit overkill on the Mainland. It's a sweet uke and the Flourocarbons like worth and Martin just seemed to make it sing. Each to their own though, my ear is not your ear.

Thanks guys, and props Kanaka for that snazzy list. Think I may look into some Worths or Martins this go around. I've never tried a set of Flourocarbon strings and they sound intriguing. And yeah, I definitly like the Aquilas and think they shound pretty terrific. However, I've also had limited experience with different string types (with the uke of course, but even with the guitar), so I'm looking for a chance to satify my own curiosity more than anything

Oddly enough, without seeing this thread, I just changed the aquilas on my red cedar top mainland to the very same martins mentioned here. The aquilas were louder, but to me, always seemed to sound almost harsh when I stummed hard (cedar tops are loud!). The Martins took away that harshness and made it a bit more well rounded- it's still pretty stinkin' loud! I reccomend given Martins a go to the red cedar owners out there.

I have a mohagony Mainland too- sounds wonderful- but I want a little louder/ brighter sound for it- that's why I checked out this thread in the first place.
Any suggestions for strings that will do that for me? Aquilas are on it now. Not sure the Martins seem the way to go... on my plastic ukes they are louder and brighter than aquilas- but, as I mentioned, they toned down the cedar top sound.

I've been using D'addrios J71s o my Mainland Mahogany, Aquilas sound a bit too brash for me.