L&H Folk Harp Stringing

[Sidney Dharmavaram]

I’m wondering about how I should be stringing my L&H Folk harp.

[Tacye]

Lever gauge strings are about 4 or 5 strings lighter than pedal gauge.

[Sidney Dharmavaram]

I’ve noticed the sound board is bulging a little.

[rod-wagoner]

Sidney,

When I had my folk harp (up until May), the soundboard bulged just a bit, even with L&H recommended strings on it.

[tony-morosco]

The Lyon and Healy Folk Harp uses Pedal gauge string, not folk gauge string. The bass wires are different from the pedal bass wires so you need to be careful when you order them that you get the correct ones, but the rest of the strings are standard pedal harp strings.

The Folk Harp is built so that you can string it with either gut or nylon as you please.

Mine also has a little bit of a bulge in the sound board. It is common on the Folk Harp. As long as it isn’t an extreme bulge it should not be a problem, although if you haven’t regulated the levers for a while you may need to in order for it to play in tune with the levers engaged (the bulge changes the length of the string slightly, and as a result the levers need to be adjusted for it to raise the pitch properly one half tone).

Switching the old strings off your pedal harp to your Folk Harp in this case will not hurt it (except the bass strings. Don’t put

[Sidney Dharmavaram]

Very informative.

[tony-morosco]

Perhaps they are, but I know that when I got mine I was specifically told by the folks at Lyon and Healy to be sure to use the folk harp wires. If you put a gauge to them and they are indeed the same thickness then it probably won’t hurt to use the ones off the pedal harp.

[Sidney Dharmavaram]

I just got off the phone with L&H West, string dept.

[tony-morosco]

Excellent information. I wil have to remember that. Thanks for sharing it.

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