The Steel Guitar Forum

I have been messing around with this site tonight. It doesn't work quite right for steels but with a little futzing I got all the information I was wondering about. Interesting stuff.

http://www.mcdonaldstrings.com/stringxxiii.html

I need one of these for my head...

plug in stressors (car needs repair, co-worker's a jerk, cheeseburger's too well done) and see at what point I might snap.

(ps: thanks, this is an interesting find, Bob)

(pps: you're an interesting find, too, Bob)

Mike

Here is another string tension calculator that I have found very useful.

http://www.pacificsites.net/~dog/String ... pplet.html

I find this one more user-friendly for steel players

If I'm building an instrument from scratch and need to determine string tension so the whole thing won't collapse, I can see how this would be handy.

Aside from that... what's the point of this calculator from the standpoint of a "normal" steeler on a day-to-day basis ?

Here is another one that has data for both nickel and stainless wound strings

http://www.greenmanhumming.com/html/Str ... e%20applet

Dean, here's an example how these calculators can be useful.
I recently used one of these to figure out if the strings I already had on hand could be used to tune my dobro to C6. I wanted to have reasonably balanced string tension across the set. So I compared the gauges I had at the pitch I wanted against gauges and tensions on my normal G-tuned dobro set to get in the ballpark. Worked out fine. Got a reasonably playable set. Played the party acoustically, which was the goal.

AH HA!

Sounds like "balanced" is the operative word.
A friend recently told me her 6-string lapsteel G6 tuning, but was unclear on gauges.

So this is to ensure some strings don't "feel" to floppy or tight compared
to their neighbors when tuned to the correct pitch... right ?

If so... thanks... this is just what I was looking for.

I wanted to know why I have ended up with the gauges I use for the different types and brands of steels I play. I have done everything by changing a string because it feels funny until I find one I like. It turns out that every string that feels right to me comes in at about 28lbs. Now I can skip the trial and error part and figure out the right strings to order ahead of time. Mostly it comes in handy with different lap steels.
For E9 pedalsteel I use pretty much the same set as
Weldon:

http://steelguitarmusic.com/strings/E9.html#wm

I've always heard those gauges reffered to as the "Emmons" set.

An Excel Spreadsheet would be more useful, as it could be tailored to one's own use. Does anyone know of one ?

Alan, about a year ago a forum member offered an Excel version in this topic:
http://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopi ... ht=#871813

Mike

Thanks Mike. I've emailed him a request, so let's see what turns up.

My own calculator can be downloaded from here: http://homepage.hispeed.ch/updowncat/string_tension.zip

Hans

Thanks Hans, that is very useful.