Tell me about low F#

[cardinal]

Alright, I’ve searched around and see a variety of strong opinions on this; figured I’d ask the fine folks here about current experiences.

I have some 5-strings with the typical low B, and I vastly prefer 34” scale to 35+.

I use Ampeg amps and sealed cabs (SVT, B15). I love how they sound.

Sooo, is a .175 string for a low F# worth me tinkering with? I don’t think that string would fit my current basses without a new nut, so it’s not just a matter of trying it for the cost of a new string.

Would the first few frets of the low F# string actually make pleasant bass noise? Or is the note and even some of the harmonics just too low or the scale too short to be pleasant?

 

[GunpointMetal]

Personally, I'd probably go a little bigger than than that, and 34" is gonna be some set-up work to get it going right. If your bridges are through-body, I'd probably not even bother. That large of a string over a bridge saddle will need to be actually bent to land in a playable location and then you lose a lot of the flexibility of the string IME. I'm not a bassist, but my bass player wanted to go octave down when I went to 8 strings, and he's running a 210 for E with a 35" scale and it is JUST enough tension to be playable, IMO. At that tuning you're pretty much not gonna hear the fundamental very well with standard amplification, but I don't think his low E is unusable because of it.

 

[NeglectedField]

One thing I would definitely be sure of is that you get one tapered at the ball end. Though I think you can't get non-tapered at that kind of ridiculously thick gauge. I'm no expert in regards to the nut so can't help you there except to say some filing will probably be necessary.

The Warwick Dark Lord is tuned down to F# so perhaps have a gander about how that's built and comes set up as standard.

 

[Winspear]

I've done E-F# on 35, 36, 37 and 40.
I will say, whilst the 40 of course sounded incredibly clear compared to the 35, there is nothing unusable about the shorter scale. To put it in perspective, a 34" F# is basically a 40" E/Eb capo'd up. So in saying the 40" performs great for E, I'm also saying 35" must be ok for F#. If that's the length you like physically then that's that! Have to make do with the darker sound.
'Pleasant' - depends what you mean. It's fairly dark sounding and you may have trouble identifying the note played by itself up to G or so, but it's a useful sound and fleshes out guitars very nicely.
Seconding that you'll want to go a bit heavier than 175 though. It's essential to have a completely buzz-free string in these tunings, else the buzz takes over the sound. I'd say 185 is just enough (this is in line with the tension of the above 210 E comment). 175 would be a touch looser than a 130 B which is already the lightest string on a regular bass.
Through-body stringing would indeed be an issue as mentioned.
Regarding nut - slots just need to be widened until the string meets the bottom (make sure it doesn't get deeper). The string itself makes a good file for this and only takes a few minutes. There is no reason you can't go back a smaller string in a wide nut slot afterwards.

 

[ixlramp]

cardinal, i think your interest means it is worth trying, nuts are cheap to replace and an easy DIY job to widen, and you very probably won't need a new nut afterwards if you go back to smaller gauges. You can only judge the tone by trying it.
34" is enough for F#, many ERB players use 34" basses. Of course a longer scale helps.

You don't need special amplification, the fundamental of B at 31Hz isn't reproduced by most amplification either. The 2nd harmonic of F# is at 46Hz which will be reproduced. So like a B all the usable tone will be in the harmonics.

Make sure to try a good quality F# string, i suggest Kalium as they seem to be the favourite sub-B strings for ERB players. Some F# strings are horrible, there is a lot of variation.
F# strings will be taperwound and it's essential to top-load them. It's also important to have a slot-loading top-load bridge to avoid passing the full gauge through any narrow holes.

 

[GunpointMetal]

Kalium makes their super-mega-jumbo-bridge cable bass and guitar strings tapered at both ends, but I don't think the taper is enough to accommodate through-body bridge designs.

 

[cardinal]

Thanks guys. My basses use a slotted toploader bridge, so I’m not too worried about that. It’s just that it’ll need nut work, and I really really really don’t want to do that to one of my Spector 5ers just to test this.

I’m looking at jumping to a 6 string but really, for me, I’d probably use a low F# like my 8-string guitars but I’m not at all a virtuoso on bass and likely wouldn’t use a high C in the least.

What I probably should do is get some real seat time with a 35” scale again or maybe even something with a fan to 37”. Maybe I can deal with the longer scale now that I’m a bit more familiar with bass than I was when i first tried a 35” scale a few years back.

 

[saved]

I have use rotosound drop zone for F# in my vig cobra 34" and it was sound good.I think it was .175

 

[cardinal]

Thanks again guys! So I screwed around with it and my takeaway is that it seems like it could work but either way I kinda want to move to six strings.

So tuned in standard and using a capo at the 2nd fret and just playing in unison with the guitar sounds good. If I had a high C, it would be easier to ditch the capo, as I’d be able to reach some of the notes a lot easier if there were another higher string.

I also tinkered with tuning down. I put the low E down to B. Super floppy, but plucking softly, it just sounded like... a low B string. So I put the low B down to F#. This is a .130 so again super floppy, but with soft attack, I could hear the notes and it sounds fine. Definitely audible and could work.

So a 6er with a high C would make playing in unison easier since it reduces some gymnastic stretches. Or a 34” 6er seems like it could work (for me) at F# with the right gauge.

 

[cardinal]

Alright, it's gonna happen. Ordered a .174 string and pulled my 34" Jazz 6er out of the closet. Gonna go loooow F# on that guy and see how it goes. I think I've been using a .130 for the low B, so the calculator makes it seem like a .174 will give about that same tension.

Hopefully I can widen the nut slots without too much trouble. I have some nice files for guitar slots sizes, but those might not be very helpful at these sizes.

 

[saved]

You can use file its made for chainsaw saw sharpening

 

[ixlramp]

Just be very careful to not deepen the nut slots, i placed an object of carefully chosen thickness on the fretboard next to the nut to stop the file touching the slot floors. You only need to file back the slot walls.
I used a (cheap) 'diamond needle file' with a gently curved abrading surface.

 

[cardinal]

Just be very careful to not deepen the nut slots, i placed an object of carefully chosen thickness on the fretboard next to the nut to stop the file touching the slot floors. You only need to file back the slot walls.
I used a (cheap) 'diamond needle file' with a gently curved abrading surface.

Thanks! I was going to fill the slot with graphite and if the bottom starts getting distributed, I’ll know I need to be more careful as I go. The backstop is a great idea.

 

[BigViolin]

Stacked feeler gauges work perfectly for this.

 

[ixlramp]

Ordered a .174 string

Seems like a Kalium gauge. Just a word of warning, apparently they can sometimes be slow to dispatch (up to a month), but seemingly always do eventually, so don't worry if it takes a long time.
I saw in a Facebook group that apparently the Kalium guy (it's a 1 man company) has been sick for weeks, which may explain why some customers have had slow dispatch recently.

 

[cardinal]

Seems like a Kalium gauge. Just a word of warning, apparently they can sometimes be slow to dispatch (up to a month), but seemingly always do eventually, so don't worry if it takes a long time.
I saw in a Facebook group that apparently the Kalium guy (it's a 1 man company) has been sick for weeks, which may explain why some customers have had slow dispatch recently.

Oof, thanks for the heads up. That sucks that he’s sick. If it’s been weeks and if he’s actually sick so bad it’s keeping him from filling orders, it must be serious.

 

[cardinal]

So I remembered that I have a Whammy V pedal and used it to detune a 5-string bass by a 4th.

It did a reasonable job turning the low E to a low B string, for example. Far from perfect, but serviceable.

So the low B turning to a low F# was... not great. I’m not sure how realistic it was compared to having an actual .170+ string tuned to F#, but the extra few notes noticeably lacked volume and were hard to distinguish. They definitely were there, but kind of a rumbling sound.

So not sure a low F# is going to be worth the trouble unless it’s one of these purpose-built machines like a Dingwall.

 

[cardinal]

Played with the Whammy a bit more. The low notes sound much better with an overdrive to add some grit and tighten it up. Also sounds much better smashing the string. Soft finger style sounds pretty muddy and muffled. But really attacking helps bring the note out.

So it seems passable, and the low string definitely seems useable after the third fret or so. It’s just the open note and the first two frets that are most dodgy.

 

[cardinal]

Hahaha low F# is awesome. Not sure why there’s so much skepticism out there; it had me freaked out.

I threw a .170 onto a 34” scale 6-string Jazz. Tuned it to F# B E A D G. Played into a dinosaur SVT/810 rig. Even with this “light” gauge and short scale, it’s totally fine.

Obviously it is super low and rumbles a bunch, but I’m not sure what anyone would have expected. I think it’s cool and works for what it is.

 

[Dayn]

I'm glad you've had good luck with it. I've used from around .170 or so to .182 on a 35" scale, but I couldn't get the sound I wanted. It works, but it's just not the right sound that I want. But maybe it's just my pickups.