I’ve had my mandolin for about six years. In all that time I’ve never changed the strings. Granted, I don’t play it as much as I do my cello, but I though it was time to try a new set of strings.
D’Addario seems to be the popular brand, and their EJ74 Phosphor Bronze stings, in the medium weight, are the ones I choose. A complete set of eight strings, two each for G, D, A, and E, cost $9.81. The current set of strings on my cello are Larsen Original A and D, paired with Thomastik Infeld Spirocore G and C. That set costs around $214. Experimenting with new mandolin strings is a lot less expensive.
I watched several videos on string changing on YouTube. The key takeaway is to not change all the strings simultaneously. The bridge is floating, held in place only by the string tension. Also, the instrument’s intonation is determined by the bridge position. Having it move during string changing would not be the end of the world, but it would take more effort to regain proper intonation.
The bridge on a cello is also held in place by tension. Furthermore, the sound post inside the instrument is held in place by tension. Removing, or even loosening, more that one cello string at a time can result in the sound post or the bridge falling. So, not letting the bridge move, by only changing a pair of strings at a time, made perfect sense to me.
Starting off I needed to remove the tail piece cover. I ended up using a micro-fiber cloth and a small flat-head screwdriver. With careful pressure I was able to pop the tail piece cover off. (Later I learned you can slide it off as well, in some cases.)
Next I loosened both G strings enough that I could remove the loop from the peg on the tail piece. Then it was easy to unwind the string from the tuning machine peg.
I ended up setting up the strings twice. Fortunately I didn’t cut the excess off immediately following the first attempt, as I needed some of that excess for take two.
On the first attempt I had the hole in the tuning peg turned so that hole through the peg was aligned from 11-4, rather then from 12-6, if there were a clock face imposed over the peg.
Pulling all the slack out of the string, taking care to have it in the correct slot on both the bridge and nut, I threaded it through the proper peg, then wound it toward the opposite side of the peg head. Then I passed it under and around itself. With the string wound like that, tightening the peg causes the string going to the nut to cross over the wrapped portion of the string, locking it in place.
What I didn’t entirely like about this setup was the small margin of “error”. Loosening the string too much could release it entirely. After watching more how-to videos, I decided that I needed to re-do my setup, this time leaving perhaps an inch of slack in the string at the peg, so that more string would be on the peg when that string was in tune. De-tuning would not release the string, unless you deliberately did so.
Everything went smoothly the second time, until one of the E strings broke. I had the original string and was able to put it back on. There may be a tonal difference between the now mismatched E strings, but my ears aren’t sensitive enough to hear it.
I think the sound is fuller and richer now. The wound strings, G and D, are considerably bigger in diameter than the original strings, and are easier to fret. At times I think I am hearing some buzzing from the G string. It’s larger diameter may be causing it to hit the first fret as it vibrates. I’ll need to watch a “set your bridge height” video or two, but I suspect I’ll need to loosen all the strings just enough to allow raising the bass side of the bridge a tiny fraction. That’s a project for another day.