blue_knight_usa
Well-known member
TUTORIAL String Gauges - How to Compare, eg. Living Waters to Worth Clears, etc.
Hello All, ever wonder if the strings you are looking at in that package are the right size, or are close in thickness to what's on your uke? Well over the years I never have mastered the mm sizes on strings in my head. I still can't remember if .024 is too thick for one of my ukes on the C string, or is it .033,. or what that .047, bah! Not having a convertor in my pocket from inches to mm, I have gotten confused and maybe someone reading this has as well (now all have converters on our cell phone...the calculator!). Well, here's just one way to compare when they don't have the translation on the package and one pack is in mm and the other in inches. Also if you don't know which is which, the number that is .0XX is usually inches and .XX is usually mm.
I have been loading up Living Waters on some of my ukes and was wondering the difference in sizes. Are the LW strings the same as say my Worth clears? Don't know as Ken's packaged in mm, and Worth's are packaged in inches for example. So I set out on the Internet and started poking around. I'll provide the one comparison to Worth Clears (as I know a lot of folks use those as well) to show you the string gauge comparison. I will use LW for Living Waters and WC for Worth Clears full size Tenor uke strings. (you get two string sets by cutting the string in half on the WC's). GCEA Tuning.
Re-Entrant Tuning (High G)
Comparison- TENOR (Worth CT's High G to Living Waters Re-Entrant High G)
----WC-T-------------------------LW-High G------------------------
A--.0224(.57 mm)---------.57mm (.0224) SAME
E--.0260 (.66 mm)---------.66mm (.0260) SAME
C--.0291 (.74 mm)---------.74mm (.0291) SAME
G--.0244 (.62 mm)---------.62mm (.0244) SAME
So you can compare and see that the strings are the same guage (thickness) and thus in this case, either will work perfectly if you have one of them one your tenor uke now. Depending on your bridge and the hole/slots, you wouldn't have any issues swapping strings. However, some sizes are quite a bit different, especially going from low G to high G. (Ko'olau Golds for example are what I call tree trunks, extremely thick and would not fit on several of my ukes, but they came natively on my first Pono).
If your uke came high G, many times the hole/slot is too small and that low G string just won't go in without having to resize the hole/slot which I won't advise on as you should talk to a luthier or someone who really understands what they are doing changing anything on the bridge so as to not introduce issues such as buzzing. I have a luthier touch mine because I am certain I would screw something up! The only thing I ever did was sand the edges of the top of a nut that was just a little sharp on the corners and that's about as far as I would go because I knew I couldn't screw up anything doing that.
There are many websites that have mm to inch convertors, but if you have a cell phone you can use this rule when looking at your strings so you don't have to get on the Internet: Handy in the store if your in a pinch and don't have a stock on hand.
TO CONVERT TO MILLIMETERS: DIVIDE INCHES X 25.4
TO CONVERT TO INCHES: MULTIPLY MILLIMETERS X 0.03937*
If the digit in the ten thousand position is a 9, most folks round it up to the next 100th. example 0.61976 is .0244, and you will see many manufactures represent this as .62, not .61. Hope that makes sense.
Keep in mind this is a thickness tutorial only. Tension is an entirely different subject. This guide is just to help determine thickness.
Cheers!
Hello All, ever wonder if the strings you are looking at in that package are the right size, or are close in thickness to what's on your uke? Well over the years I never have mastered the mm sizes on strings in my head. I still can't remember if .024 is too thick for one of my ukes on the C string, or is it .033,. or what that .047, bah! Not having a convertor in my pocket from inches to mm, I have gotten confused and maybe someone reading this has as well (now all have converters on our cell phone...the calculator!). Well, here's just one way to compare when they don't have the translation on the package and one pack is in mm and the other in inches. Also if you don't know which is which, the number that is .0XX is usually inches and .XX is usually mm.
I have been loading up Living Waters on some of my ukes and was wondering the difference in sizes. Are the LW strings the same as say my Worth clears? Don't know as Ken's packaged in mm, and Worth's are packaged in inches for example. So I set out on the Internet and started poking around. I'll provide the one comparison to Worth Clears (as I know a lot of folks use those as well) to show you the string gauge comparison. I will use LW for Living Waters and WC for Worth Clears full size Tenor uke strings. (you get two string sets by cutting the string in half on the WC's). GCEA Tuning.
Re-Entrant Tuning (High G)
Comparison- TENOR (Worth CT's High G to Living Waters Re-Entrant High G)
----WC-T-------------------------LW-High G------------------------
A--.0224(.57 mm)---------.57mm (.0224) SAME
E--.0260 (.66 mm)---------.66mm (.0260) SAME
C--.0291 (.74 mm)---------.74mm (.0291) SAME
G--.0244 (.62 mm)---------.62mm (.0244) SAME
So you can compare and see that the strings are the same guage (thickness) and thus in this case, either will work perfectly if you have one of them one your tenor uke now. Depending on your bridge and the hole/slots, you wouldn't have any issues swapping strings. However, some sizes are quite a bit different, especially going from low G to high G. (Ko'olau Golds for example are what I call tree trunks, extremely thick and would not fit on several of my ukes, but they came natively on my first Pono).
If your uke came high G, many times the hole/slot is too small and that low G string just won't go in without having to resize the hole/slot which I won't advise on as you should talk to a luthier or someone who really understands what they are doing changing anything on the bridge so as to not introduce issues such as buzzing. I have a luthier touch mine because I am certain I would screw something up! The only thing I ever did was sand the edges of the top of a nut that was just a little sharp on the corners and that's about as far as I would go because I knew I couldn't screw up anything doing that.
There are many websites that have mm to inch convertors, but if you have a cell phone you can use this rule when looking at your strings so you don't have to get on the Internet: Handy in the store if your in a pinch and don't have a stock on hand.
TO CONVERT TO MILLIMETERS: DIVIDE INCHES X 25.4
TO CONVERT TO INCHES: MULTIPLY MILLIMETERS X 0.03937*
If the digit in the ten thousand position is a 9, most folks round it up to the next 100th. example 0.61976 is .0244, and you will see many manufactures represent this as .62, not .61. Hope that makes sense.
Keep in mind this is a thickness tutorial only. Tension is an entirely different subject. This guide is just to help determine thickness.
Cheers!
Last edited:
you sure need therapy...LOL ha ha
