Pyramid strings
German stringmaker Pyramid has made some special strings, suitable for “electric” (working with electro-magnetic pickup) full size sitars. They make brass wound polished strings for laraj & kharaj 0.55mm (.021) & 0.74mm (.030) and heavy kharaj 0.92mm (.036). And also brass coated steel wire ranging from 0.18mm (.007) to 0.38mm (.015), good for all other strings such as tarav, cikari, baj and jora tar.
I ‘ve ordered and tried the brass flatwounds for laraj & kharaj and brass coated steel wire for jora on my SAS-01 and SAS-02. The brass flatwounds sound very good, brilliant and accurate but a little more harsh than I am used with the bronze flatwounds from India. They are also not as flat as their bronze indian brothers. But the latter are very fragile. The bronze winding breaks easily while playing heavy meend. I don’t know (yet) how strong the pyramids are. The brass coated steel wire behaves quite similar to the full steel jora string. There is a noticeable improvement to the jora tar tuning problem but the overall sound volume remains the same. I had hoped that by using this brass coating the volume difference between baj and jora tar would become less. There is only a very small improvement. The only solution seems to be the fitting of a thinner jora string. Or, maybe someone can make me some bronze coated steel wire instead of brass coated ??
Hi! I am using Pyramid Gold short scale flat bass strings. They feel like eternal, sounds good and I like them. I’ve been using this set almost five years. Are there any recommendations how often they should be changed?
I need 50 metre ( .0125 inch ) pyramid sitar string coil.Which will be the best ? (The silver plated or the gold plated ). I have a very good old Hiren Roy’ s sitar.So if you can , please help me sharing your information. I also want to know how much cost , it will be. Thanking you.
For Pyramid strings you should adress to: pyramid@junger.de or more info at http://www.pyramid-strings.de/
Silver or gold,… there is only a difference in sound. And, this is very personal… try it out with a couple of samples prior to buy your coil.
You could try the nickel flatwounds from Pyramid? Might be what you’re looking for. For bronze coated steel you could maybe see if Newtone can make them in the UK.
Dear Chico,
I never laid hands on this sitar, so I cannot say. But if this is a full sitar scale length (distance between jiwari and tar daan = 840 – 875 cm) then you can use this set.
Baj tar (playing string) = .012 (0.30mm), jora = .015 (0.38mm), laraj = .021 (0.56mm) and kharaj = .030 (0.72mm). Cikari and tarav = .009 (0.23mm).
Hi!
I’m looking forward for a new string set. Would You recommend me one? I have a wood eletric sitar like this one that a buyed 6 months ago. With you large experience, what do you think about this sitar too?
See ya! I love your blog that always show something new and interesting about this fragile world of the sitars.