I recently bought a couple of sets of John Pearse medium phosphor bronze strings. The first set I put on sounded great, maybe a tad more depth than the D'ad EJ17s I've long used. I was looking forward to putting on the second set and seeing if my impression was valid.

Near the end of a week of extensive playing at an Old Time festival, while I was playing at about 40-50% volume, the G string broke. As I break about a string a year, if that, I was surprised, but I figured that maybe the heavy use over 6-7 days had worn it out.

A couple of days later, I was chatting with a friend who plays a lot, and mentioned I had liked the sound of the Pearses. He said, "I do, too, but they always break on me." This is someone who plays hard, and whom I have played at least 60 hours with without ever seeing him break the D'ads he plays.

So it's got me wondering: has anyone else had the experience of finding that John Pearses are more likely to break on you than other brands of strings? Or have I and my friend just had some bad luck?

B

I would vote 'bad luck.' I know a lot of people, including seasoned, pro flatpickers, who swear by 'em, and I've never heard of a breakage issue.

Personally - I love the Pearse tone, but I don't love it any more than the EJ17 tone. My issue with Perase strings is that they accrue 'finger gunk' faster than any other string I've tried -- and if I'm playing a lot (the norm), they're really grimy & dead-sounding after 3-4 days.

And I'm fully willing to blame body chemistry for this issue.

B, sounds kinda freaky that it was the G that broke. I've been playin for over 40 years, and I've never had a G break (its the high E that does me in from time to time; no particular brand).

I've gone through about 75 sets of Pearse strings and I've only ever had one string break (high E) and I dig in pretty hard at times. Bad luck is my guess.

No. Big no. I've played Pearse almost constantly since '94, dozens of boxes. I've never broken a string playing. There have been, two or three either plain E or B strings that have lost their ball end while tightening to pitch. That's it. I don't hold back, but then I don't view the guitar as a blunt instrument. I play Pete Townshend songs on occasion, but not like Pete. When I hear of repeated string breaks, I think bridge/saddle. tom

Well, alright then! Thanks for the feedback, guys.

B

Interesting comments on string breakage and Pearse strings. It has been a while since I have tried them, so I may have to give them another try.

I find it very interesting that most people never break their 'G' strings. If I break a string, and I usually do after a couple of weeks of gigging/playing, it is the 'G' sting 95% of the time ('D' string the other 5%). I never break 'E's or 'B's. I have done this on all my guitars for a long time, so not a bridge saddle issue. I have been known to dig in pretty hard from time to time, so that probably explains it.

John Pearse are tonally my favorite strings on my D1A, but I use the 80/20. Never broken a JP string. The only string I always break is the G on Elixirs....every set I ever used.

quote:

Originally posted by TTerral:
I find it very interesting that most people never break their 'G' strings. If I break a string, and I usually do after a couple of weeks of gigging/playing, it is the 'G' sting 95% of the time...

Breaking the G is not so rare. That string is the smallest of the wound strings and I believe that the core inside of it might even be thinner than the high E, or so I once heard. It could also have something to do with the nut. Maybe the slot for your G has a jagged edge? You'd know because it would always break at that point.

Ain't it intriguing how folks' experiences differ: while it is true that I rarely break a string, it's almost always the G string when I do. And this has happened on four different dreads over the years.

Must be that dang G run you keep playing over and over

I usually break my 'G' string at the saddle. The notch/slot that forms on the saddle after a while is probably the culprate. I take 0000 steel wool to the saddle to smooth out the notch and that seems to help (for a while). By the way, I use Elixirs (Nanoweb Phosphur Bronze), but I have had the problem with other strings, including my personal favorite strings, D'adarrio J17s. Unfortunately, my body chemistry does not allow me to use the J17s very often.

I should have qualified my statement saying I found it interesting "that most people never break 'G' strings". I meant to infer the folks who had posted on this thread, up to that point. In talking with other players/retailers over the years, if one is going to break a string, the 'G' string is by far the most common string to break, probably for the very reasons elambo states.

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