What is a wound string and why do we use them?
All pedal harps and most lever harps have monofilament nylon or gut in the range between strings 1 and 24, and nylon or bronze wound strings on the lower range. Winding a string increases its mass, which lowers its frequency and increases its tension without sacrificing flexibility. Nylon core strings wrapped with nylon have certain problems. Because nylon is stretchy, repeated tuning continues to stretch the string, causing it to lose mass, which in turn causes the wrap material to become looser. But if the core is stretched to its limit on the string machine while it is being wrapped, the wrap not only acts like a corset, it actually imbeds itself in the core, holding the string in its stretched state until it is installed. Finding the optimum diameter for the desired tension without producing a thubby bass is the key. A wrapped nylon string tends to have the same tone character as the higher monofilaments, which is considered an advantage over a string package that combines monofila
