Okay I've decided to get my AT500 re-strung because I got it about a year ago and the tension seems to have dropped rather significantly. What I've been thinking of doing (some guy recommended this) is having the strings pre-stretched 10%, strung at 24 lbs, then I was told after about a week of playing it'll drop to around 21-22 and stay there.... (Which is where I want the tension... 21-22 ish). So.... has anyone done this? Like has anyone tried this... did the tension drop 2-3 lbs ish and then stay put...? Also... I'm kind of deciding between plain old BG-65 and trying BG-80.... from personal experience which seems to have the best balance between performance/durability
That's is normal for tention to drop up to within a week because the string will stabilize after stretching. The question about how much it will drop will be dependent on the string and possibly how well the stringer is. For me, I'm using Gosen Pro 66, and when the string stabilizes, it drops up from at least 0.5lb to 0.75lb (from the sound). String for a year hmm, normally a string would need to be changed every year anyways because the string would try out on the inside degrading the performance overtime.
Personally, I don't think it is a good idea to pre-stretch the string before stringing. Strings have elasticity or resilience and creep properties, which are not well understood. Resilience or elasticity property will be adversely affected if you pre-stretch the string, because all pre-stretching does is to reduce the string's resilience a little more. For those who have played with natural gut, the huge difference between natural gut and synthetic is due to natural gut's superior resilience property. Resilience and creep are related, more negatively for synthetic than for natural gut. Synthetic strings will start losing resilience over time and their creep property is also going downhill. Creep means that if the original string is 26 feet long and its present length is 28 feet long, then your string has a creep loss. Natural gut has very minimal creep loss or resilience deterioration. If you use natural gut you do not have to replace the string until it breaks. Its performance will last as long as the string's life. Not so with synthetics. The best synthetics play at their best for about a week or so. To say that your synthetic string can last a year may save you money but it certainly will not reward you with the very best your string can offer you. To put it simply, pre-stretching a string is like pre-aging it. Why would you want to do that?
I agree with taneepak. I suggest stringing at 23, without pre-stretching, and it will drop down to your ideal level. Also, I'm in favour of BG-65... I've never noticed a different performance from the price with any more expensive string. Especially since at high levels of competition, strings break all the time, so cheap is the way to go for me. And since you're planning for it to lose tension, then the added stability of more expensive string isn't really that big of a boon.
I agree. Sometimes, we need to do a bit trade off between the performance vs. maintain tension. Tension last forever is a good $$$ saver, but you take a cut on performance as well.
