How were strings made in the 1800's

[cwness]

I was watching a western and so a guy playing guitar and wondered

how did they make the strings back then. Were the ESD wound?

Did they make them the same way they do now? Any one know?

 

CW

[Riverside]

Sometime Google is good for stuff like this - sometimes not:

 

http://www.ehow.com/about_5069939_history-steelstring-guitars.html

[jimmiJAMM]

Well, first you kill the cat...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catgut

[cwness]

Sometime Google is good for stuff like this - sometimes not:

 

http://www.ehow.com/about_5069939_history-steelstring-guitars.html

 

Thanks for the link but I asked how they were made as in Manufactured not the

history.

 

CW

[Thundergod]

Weren't they made with animal guts? I think I read somewhere that's an urban legend only and they were made from other stuff (not their guts but theor scrotum).

[jimmiJAMM]

Weren't they made with animal guts? I think I read somewhere that's an urban legend only and they were made from other stuff (not their guts but theor scrotum).

 

Yep. Catgut's a type of cord that is prepared from the natural fibre in the walls of animal intestines.

[milod]

http://books.google.com/books?id=4QTfTINjQtUC&pg=PA199&lpg=PA199&dq=steel+wire+history+guitar+strings&source=bl&ots=XYydw-670t&sig=8XJxlpSH-TF-VZL_w0jTGK_LdIA&hl=en&ei=qBvaS7CNBo7YNcj33JwB&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CC0Q6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

If that works, it'll tell you more about the technology of guitar strings, especially metal ones, than you may be interested in reading.

 

I knew there were a lot of really rapid changes in wire-making technology and metals through the 1700s and 1800s that made increasing inroads into music. Various keyboard instruments, after all, had used wire for years. But the cost of wire and some difficulties in manufacture were a bit up to question.

 

Here's the bottom line, the thickness of a string vs the tension on a string must be matched. Wrapping a string drawn to optimal tension allowed strings to work much better than a wire alone.

 

The wrapping process was something like a set of pulleys running down a drawn-out wire to wrap it. Similar technology had been applied to various sorts of ropes and cables...

 

For what my own opinion's worth, the improvements in wire made baroque music possible as larger audiences were coming available and the old gut strings just plain wouldn't have been heard. Haydn wasn't hidin' his music... <grin>

 

OTOH, wire had been used before in musical instruments, but as technology improved metals and consistency of drawing wire, it became obvious to musical instrument techies that it had some real advantages.

 

Note that this change for musical instrument strings came almost concurrent with new instruments. The saxophone, for example, is mid 1800s. The late 1800s and early 1900s had all kinds of variations of stringed instruments alone - harp guitar, banjolins...

 

m

[cwness]

Thanks Milo that's what I was looking for. I figured there had to some type

of string manufacturing because of the piano.

 

CW

[Riverside]

Thanks for the link but I asked how they were made as in Manufactured not the

history.

 

CW

 

Well, I guess my search sucked.

 

Feel free to try one on your own.

[cwness]

Well' date=' I guess my search sucked.

 

Feel free to try one on your own.[/quote']

I did at and came up with what you did so that's why I posted.

You should try reading the post before answering.

CW

[Riverside]

I did at and came up with what you did so that's why I posted.

You should try reading the post before answering.

CW

 

Well, I didn't try very hard.