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I have always saved broken bass strings to use as splicing material, but have wondered about ordering #23-25 wire. Would that work? Good idea, bad idea? What do you use?

Thanks,
Charles Belknap

If you replace a set of bass strings, you get cuttings from the ends of those strings which can be used for splicing. There is no need to buy anything else.

A perfect match is not necessary in any case. The splice should not be in the speaking portion of the string, unless there is no way of avoiding it, and in that case, it is not going to be a significant length of the string, anyway.

What BDB said. But if you don't have a variety of sizes from a bass restringing job you could order some larger core wire for the thicker strings. However, I would not use a piece of #23 core wire to splice a broken string that has, for example, a #17 core. Probably best to match up the two so that they are within one size of each other.

In a pinch, you can also sometimes remove what's left of the core wire from the tuning pin, cut off the becket, straighten it out, then use as your "new" splice leader. Form a smaller coil on a dummy pin, and reinstall. You might only end up with two coils instead of three or four, but it can work. Really tough with the lowest 6 or 7 monochords, though.

I managed to do that with A#0 on a short upright once. It was a nightmare, but I got there eventually. Had no wire anywhere near big enough! Straightening out wire that thick in order to form a new coil is very tricky!

I have an endless supply of cuttings, thanks to the Shout House gig...