What Do You Do With Old Strings ?

Torben Koch · Post by **Torben Koch** » 16 Apr 2007 10:13 pm

Hi Alan
I change strings about every 4 weeks - depend on how many gigs I have.
About what I do with the old strings - I'm giving my old plain strings to my cheesedealer and I got a peace of chese for them - he loves my plain strings and says, "these are the best I can get for my cheesecutter".

Turbo
www.myspace.com/torbenturbo
www.pedalsteel4u.dk

Tony Davis · Post by **Tony Davis** » 17 Apr 2007 3:58 am

Well I send all my broken stings to my adopted Sister in Ireland,,,,Anne Marie O'Keefe and to my adopted Cousin Donna in Georgia.....they are busy knitting the strings into protective Jackets for all of our Troops overseas
In Fact I am considering mounting a campain of support for our troops oversas.....could have a pic of Miss Donna holding up old Glory in a Star Spangled Bikini
And also a Pic of Anne Marie in a Bikini with the Irish colours...........gee....I startedto type more as it came to mind....but I was getting a bit irreverent so I wont
Tony

Don Ricketson · Post by **Don Ricketson** » 17 Apr 2007 9:25 am

I had a rancher one time that wanted my wound strings. He said he was going to use them to de-horn his calves. Later he told me it worked.

Mat Rhodes · Post by **Mat Rhodes** » 17 Apr 2007 9:34 am

As a professional assassin, I like to use my old .016 strings as a strangulation device. The others have to be discarded because they just don't "cut it".

Bob Cox · Post by **Bob Cox** » 17 Apr 2007 2:52 pm

Wind each end around a pencil,with a see saw efort you can use it to remove a fret board on your steel with minimal damage.

Tommy White · Post by **Tommy White** » 17 Apr 2007 7:02 pm

I like Brint's answer. I change strings quite often on my pedal steel guitars and resonator guitars. Kerry Marx, my friend and colleague at the Grand Ole Opry, takes disgarded strings to be recycled. I have not asked him where, but I will.
Back in the day, my bassist brother and I would boil the wound strings in water when they went dead. A practice that only rejuvenated life for a day or two. Most often the strings would note very flat or break winding them back up to pitch.

Terry Wood · Post by **Terry Wood** » 18 Apr 2007 12:04 pm

I save them for my older brother who uses them when he goes shark fishing.

Seriously, he uses the things as leaders to fish with. Of course, he's the only guy I know who hops in his rig and just heads out for Florida, Colla-rodeo, or Canada to fish and hunt when he takes a notion. Must be nice!

El Woodrow alias T. Wood

John Bechtel · Post by **John Bechtel** » 19 Apr 2007 6:36 pm

I cut their balls off and save them in a plastic medicine-bottle, thinking that some day I might want to string them into a piece of jewelry of some kind! Meanwhile I have a large~bottle of small~balls, or is it a small~bottle of large-balls?

Brint Hannay · Post by **Brint Hannay** » 19 Apr 2007 6:56 pm

John,
GOOD THING WE KNOW YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT STRINGS!!!!!

Per Berner · Post by **Per Berner** » 19 Apr 2007 9:50 pm

I do what Big John does. I've been saving every single ball end off of every string I've used for twentyfive years. Kind of disappointing in some ways – it takes years to fill even a tiny 35 mm film container. They take up no space at all.

But I use mine for fretboard markers on my self-built guitars. Looks really neat. Some day I intend to cover an entire guitar top with string ball ends - filled with black epoxy, polished and then clear coated.

Scott Henderson · Post by **Scott Henderson** » 20 Apr 2007 5:35 am

I PLAY THEM !!!!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 20 Apr 2007 1:03 pm

There are two types of balls at the ends of strings, the cheapo pressed-brass ones and the cast brass ones. The cast brass ones can be used as bridge rollers.

John Bechtel · Post by **John Bechtel** » 20 Apr 2007 3:56 pm

If I remember correctly, Sho-Bud used Ball~Ends when they first started using a Roller~Nut!

Eddie D.Bollinger · Post by **Eddie D.Bollinger** » 20 Apr 2007 9:34 pm

I have used the big wound ones on my WeedEater in tall grass. They are tough.

Eddie

Lonnie Zsigray · Post by **Lonnie Zsigray** » 21 Apr 2007 2:09 pm

I have used the lighter unwound ones to replicate the whip antennas on my police car models.Handy to keep one or two around for stuff.The rest go into the can.

Marc Jenkins · Post by **Marc Jenkins** » 21 Apr 2007 3:33 pm

I work in a music store, and until recently, we had boxes of old strings lying around. A month or so back, a local musician went for a holiday in Cuba, and brought all our old guitar, violin, cello and bass strings along. Apparently music students there often can't afford or obtain strings, and what we'll throw away as trash they will gladly make music on.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 21 Apr 2007 4:29 pm

Eddie D.Bollinger wrote:I have used the big wound ones on my WeedEater in tall grass. They are tough.
Eddie

...and if you use the right gauge of guitar string on a weed-whacker it will slice through your shoe and your skin. Be sure not to do it in bare feet !

Eddie D.Bollinger · Post by **Eddie D.Bollinger** » 21 Apr 2007 8:49 pm

Alan, you are right. Heavy boots are needed.
They make a neat sound while they are spinning
though.

Bill Duve · Post by **Bill Duve** » 23 Apr 2007 2:46 pm

Just after I unwind them from the roller brush on the vacum cleaner I toss em out

Doug Earnest · Post by **Doug Earnest** » 23 Apr 2007 5:09 pm

When I was a kid Mom used to make me go outside to change my strings so they wouldn't get into the vacuum cleaner.

Ray Jenkins · Post by **Ray Jenkins** » 23 Apr 2007 5:30 pm

Alan F. Brookes wrote:When the question gets asked, "How often do you change strings ?" many members reckon they change their strings regularly, as much as every session. What do they do with their old strings which still have a lot of life left in them ?

Give them to Smiley Roberts,he'll think you got him an endorsement.
Ray

Anita Kleinow · Post by **Anita Kleinow** » 30 Apr 2007 9:19 am

I swear this is true! My brothers and I saw an old movie and they were talking about using piano wire to rub out a mob guy. We made our own blow darts out of thick magazine paper for the darts, drop the darts into you 'blow stick'? Tear of the end of the dart that doesn't slip through easily and blow! We tried putting our dad's old strings in the tip, about a four inch length. Whoeeeee! We're lucky no one was killed. Those puppies would go through small tree trunks! heehee

Tim Fleming · Post by **Tim Fleming** » 1 May 2007 9:04 am

Dental Floss...no wonder those gaps keep widening!

Doug Jones · Post by **Doug Jones** » 1 May 2007 6:23 pm

Mental Floss....... I take a 68 and shove it one ear and out the other. Do a little back and forth Mental Flossing. You'd be suprised the stuff that comes out; both on the string and on the steel....

Mark Lind-Hanson · Post by **Mark Lind-Hanson** » 3 May 2007 2:24 pm

Something I used to do (though not for a while now ) was to send them down to my aunt who's an artist-
she'd bend them around into flower-petal shapes and dip them into an acrylic plastic & come up with multicolored, multipetaled flowers. Stopped for some whiles when I switched over to nylon string, but it's a valid idea.

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What Do You Do With Old Strings ?

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