Before we put our name on a
product, there must be something special about it or
we will
not risk our reputation on it.
The players deserve the best and it is our goal to
find it and
supply it when we can. Our
constant search for better leaves no rock unturned. In
car
racing, it is the last half
second in 500 miles, where the big money is. Seconds
become
minutes and results can be laps
ahead of the competition.
We believe that Curt Mangan
Strings gives that extra edge as they believe in the
same
ethics. We are foremost proud
that they are made in the U.S.A. which is where Yates
Banjos is also located.
It is common that the packages
of strings are labeled as Stainless Steel which
signifies the
wrapping on the 4th string only. Often
buyers assume that all of the strings are stainless
and they don’t buy. If this
were true, I couldn’t agree more. Stainless Steel is
an alloy
that is very high in nickel
which is known not to conduct much of anything very
well,
such as heat, electricity and
yes, vibrations and sound. It is good to prevent rust
in normal
applications.
With that said, stainless
windings are quite different in nature. Let’s first
explore strings
and their uses in general; when
a string is pulled to a particular tension to reach a
certain
pitch, the string or wire must
change in thickness to overcome air losses. As a
string
moves through air, it slows
down until is stops. This is good as the musician can
use that
to get one note out of the way
before the next note starts. If a string is too thin,
the tension
is reduced and its ability to
cut through the wind and rattle the box, as we say,
does not
stand up to the demand. The
lower the tension, the bigger the string must be.
Often in order to achieve the
correct tension and wind resistance, a smaller string
is used
for the tension, but is then
wrapped to give weight or mass to the lightly moving
wire.
Stainless steel is a heavy
metal so we can get more movement and maintain the
smallest
diameter. The core wire and all
of the other wires in these sets are known as plain
steel;
this does not mean soft. This
is easy to test; stainless steel does not stick to a
magnet
where steel does.
These plain steel strings are
made of a special alloy of high tinsel steel. They are
formed
by a process call Wire Drawing.
A wire starts as a rod that is pulled through rollers
and
stretched to form the desired
diameter. In materials, there is tensile strength
which
measures its breaking point.
This point is the yield of the wire. Before that, a
material
goes through elongation in the
plastic stage. Once all of the elongation has
occurred, it
will not stretch any more
without risk of breaking. At this point, elongation
basically is
un-noticed and the wire becomes
stable for holding tune. Wire drawing is done cold so
no
annealing is done.
Once the wire is pulled to size
and elongation is controlled, the wire then receives a
very
thin coating of tin (Sn) to
deter the onset of rust. This is then called Swedish
Wire. There
is a balance between the
protective coating and changing the tonal qualities;
however, a
string will rust in time. As
strings age and accumulate playing time on the
instrument,
the pores become full of dirt
and oil and flat spots occur from the frets. This is
when they
need to be replaced.
