Why hasn't anyone made a tapered string?

Grave Bomber

Grave Bomber

Ghoulish Anomaly
This crossed my mind this morning...I'd love if I could have a set of strings that tapered from 11's to 9's.

Would that not work? Would there be an issue in regards to tension and setup? I'm curious why it hasn't been done.
 
Some bass strings are wound to be tapered where the string breaks over the bridge. The idea, as I heard it, is to have a little less mass at the string fulcrum point to give a little more lively string vibration. So, someone has thought of it, at least in principle.

As for why not on guitar strings, I have no real idea. Tapered strings shouldn't create any tuning issues, but I'm not sure on what would be the benefits.
 
I actually think it's an interesting thought. I don't know what the practical benefits would be, necessarily.

Until then, yeah, just go with 10's. :thu:
 
Guitar Heel said:
I actually think it's an interesting thought. I don't know what the practical benefits would be, necessarily.

Until then, yeah, just go with 10's. :thu:
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I think that the taper would have to optimized for your guitar (22, 24 3/4, 25, 25 1/2" scales) and tuning as it would effect the performance and placement. The string would have to stop at 11 at its thickest and 9 at its thinnest in order for any notion of structural integrity...if the taper doesn't complete destroy that.

And where would the taper be? For the upper frets or the lower range? How would it effect bending? If a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, wouldn't the string only be as strong as it thickest part? and therefore potentially weaker and more apt to prematurely break at its thinnest?

Sorry...rambling
 
Tapered thin to thicker, headstock to bridge? Less finger pressure required, and more sound?
 
Even is you could, HOW would you know how long to make the taper....
Some guitars have strings going through a tone bar very close to the bridge, some may have a trapeze tail thus more string is on the guitar between the tail and bridge... So many configurations that would mess with the placement of the taper....
 
irishstu said:
Wouldn't a tapered string totally screw with intonation?
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This.

I once had the winding peel off a D string from the 12th fret down. On a lark I goofed off with it. The vibration took on this multi tonality that wasn't harmonically pleasing because the harmonic nodes were at different parts of the string. Sounded bad!

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