Top Wrapping

NeMiSiS

Any players here use this technique ?
Any advantages/disadvantages.. I've heard it increases sustain.. and tone.
Jimmy Page, Zakk Wylde and Billy Gibbons string like this..



I am sending two LP's in for servicing and was toying with the idea of stringing them like this..

p.s. this thread may be suited better to Playing Techniques etc forum..

Thanks!
Tom

Karl Hungus

I've heard that too. Best off just trying it and seeing if you notice a difference. Why not just go for it?

Dord

Wouldn't that change the angle the strings break at the nut?

NeMiSiS

[Karl]

I am going to be recording with the two guitars very soon so didn't want to do any dramatic bollixing round with them. When I am finished doing the recording I will give it a shot. Was just curious to see if any other LP players were using it..and do I have to do anything weird with the tail piece and bridge. Other forums recommend using the ball ends off your previous strings as kind of 'spacers'. Like this;



Joe it's meant to seriously minimize breaking strings too.. and make pinch harmonics "clearer"

Tom

Johnny Storm

NeMiSiS wrote: »

[Karl]
Other forums recommend using the ball ends off your previous strings as kind of 'spacers'. Like this;




Tom

Sorry, I can't really see where the old ball end are in that photo?
Back in the aul' days the idea of wrapping over the tail piece was to allow you to screw the tail piece fully flat to the body, supposedly improving the mechanical link between string and body, supposedly resulting in more sustain. It never made any difference on my POS LP copy that I could notice.

Doctor J

I think it's just a myth carried over from the original stop-tail bridge, where they just had the stop-tail, not the tuneomatic part, which was the bridge and the strings got wrapped around it like that. Some folks just kept stringing the bridge like that and some other folks think it looks cool. Physically, it just changes the string-break over the bridge to something resembling a Fender Jaguar, which I thought was a bad thing

Eoin Madsen

If anything, raising the angle of the string from the bridge might cause a loss of sustain if the string contact with the bridge slips or jumps under play. Much like stringing too high on the post, or removing the string retainer on a Strat.

Once you have secure contact with the bridge and nut, nothing outside the free moving portion of the string should have any relevant impact on anything. The string-through-body thing is the same. I'd want to see some physics before I'd accept that it makes any difference.

NeMiSiS

Johnny Storm wrote: »

Sorry, I can't really see where the old ball end are in that photo?
Back in the aul' days the idea of wrapping over the tail piece was to allow you to screw the tail piece fully flat to the body, supposedly improving the mechanical link between string and body, supposedly resulting in more sustain. It never made any difference on my POS LP copy that I could notice.

They're are in the bridge, they are threaded on.. as in you take them off and put onto the strings.

I just dropped them into the guitar tech and asked him.. he didn't really see the point. Said he screws the tail down into the body.. so that resonance of the strings goes back into body .. or something along those lines.. (really I have no idea.. guitar techs are crazy geniuses!) he did say though if you were having trouble breaking strings then it would probably help. I will try it anyway for kicks when I am finished recording.. and report back of course!


Link with some more info ; http://www.dominocs.com/AshBassGuitar/stoptailwrap.html
Tom

Eoin Madsen

NeMiSiS wrote: »

Said he screws the tail down into the body.. so that resonance of the strings goes back into body .. or something along those lines.. (really I have no idea.. guitar techs are crazy geniuses!)

Yeah... see, that sounds like total BS tbh. The resonance in the portion of the string after the bridge is

A) not remotely harmonic with the actual note played
insignificant in amplitude

The only possibility I can think of is that the downward vector of the string tension introduced by the angle of the string might be a component in the resonance of the system. But even by that logic, this exercise is going to reduce sustain, not increase it. And it still has nothing to do with resonance after the point of contact with the bridge.

NeMiSiS

May not have been exactly what he said.. it something along those lines.
He was speaking about a normal setup and not a top wrap setup. He did not see any benefit in it other than maybe reducing strings breaking.
He's a very good guitar tech.. I wouldn't like to think he was being called a bull****ter, just because I misunderstood what he was saying and trying to explain to me.

Tom