is it possible to tune a B E A D down to E A D G? is there possibley thick enough gauges of string to accomplish this? ive only been playing bass for a month or so (been playing guitar for about 5 years, just got an acoustic bass) and im thinking of getting a custom 3 string electric bass , but i want to be able to get the absolute lowest sound i can possibley get out of it, so im not sure if you can tune say for example the lowest strings on a 6 string bass down an octave lower than a normal bass. can anyone help me with this?

A full octave below the normal bass E? That might be too low. Wouldn't it be just a useless rumble? Then again, I guess 6-stringed basses can go pretty low. Anyway, yeah, you'd need some pretty heavy duty strings. Unless you want a bunch of problems with adjustments because of the really really thick gauge strings (which you would need since you don't want 'em flopping around like an overworked hooker), you should definitely have a custom built one for that. I'm just not sure if it would work at all.

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thanks. im aiming for a sub-sonic sound if i switch over to bass for my friend's band. im going to get a custom built one im thinking from krappy guitars, which are suprisingly nice for cheap as dirt guitars (http://www.krappyguitars.com/)

I once tuned my B string down to E when I was bored. What you play isn't very interesting though ... it's too hard to tell the tone of the notes you are playing. For fun I would play the same fret on my B string (which was tuned to E) and on my E string, which stayed in standard.
So it was like playing things on the E string that were backed by a lower octave! Only that way could you tell what notes I was playing.

I wouldn't waste more than 15 minutes of my time on something like that though ...

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a six string bass doesnt go any lower than a 5
5 = beadg
6 = beadgc

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Right. I don't know what I was thinking. Probably I was thinking of a 12-string. Which is just a stupid concept in my opinion anyway. But don't twelve strings go below B?

And "Krappy" guitars? What a name. At least they don't try to false advertise.

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Tim C. from Audioslave (Rage) does this. He simply takes the B,E,A,D from a 5 string set of strings and strings them on his 4 string. Of course you will need to do some trussrod adjustments to compensate for the different tension but it works!

ok ppl your goan confuse him lol .I play a 5-string and i know 5 sting tuning is beadg and a 4 sting is eadg of you can get a 5 string with eadgc or a 6 string with beadgc but to get any lower then the low b isnt posible woulndt have good tonality to it and a and an 8 sting and a 12 sring have the same notes as a 4 stign and a 6 stign but with a high octave sting right under each sting. well i might have just confused him more lol opp o well

no
nothing will ever go lower than a b unless you downtune it.
basses are wierd like that. The strings only go higher after you go over 5 strings.

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Sorry I-Heart-Hate, but thats not exactly true. I recently saw a Ritter 7-String which had a low F# string. There might be more Basses tuned this way, i dont know.
And there is this stupid bloke playing C# F# H E or something like that. And i mean the Subcontra C#....

well i guess your best bet would be to get a 5-string and down tune it because the 7string volvox was talking about was probaly a custom or at least, a very expsensive bass. but you might want to try it first cuz i agree with rattlehead, it will probably just sound like low loud mush. but then again if your aim is a custom maybe you can work something out with them so the bass is designed for some super low tuning.

just on a side note did anyone look at that krappy website? theres some 2 string bass that basically a pencil

technically you can drop that low, but its going to sound like absolute shit. think korns bass sound but floppier and even more toneless. if youre in need of a "sub sonic" bass note i would suggest a) using some sort of electronics to achieve it, or b) if you can get you hands on a contra bassoon (obviously this might be tough, maybe an option for recording though). you may also try dropping your mids all the way down and your bass all the way up, this will make your bass sound much bassier and more felt than heard, and can be really effective when playing metal. best of luck to you.

Is that even possible? Korn's bass tone is looser than my grandmother.


This would be a nice thing to try out. Find a good whammy effects pedal or something that knocks your pitch an octave lower and make sure you like that subsonic shitty sound before you go screwing with custom basses or messing up your own. This thread's remotely old, so he might have already decided. But either way, there's my (second) opinion.

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i raely woudlnt atempt to tune lower then a be becuse on my 5 string if my b is flat it ratles hoiply and shoudlnt liek shit and for the custome thign woudlnt be cheap cuse it woudl ahve to be a compltly coutome made string cuse i use custom gages and my b is the thinkest gage i can find

i play in a band that tunes to drop b, so if i had a 5 string would i use the 5th string as just b and une the four others up???

or would i drop the 4th string to b and have the 5th string as a f#???

fuck! i LOVE! bass

Probably not the forum to be in then douchebag.

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fuck i hate bass.....[/QUOTE]
given the nature of this question i assume you are roughly 13 and dont have a solid grip on the bass or any other instrument for that matter.
perhaps your dislike for the bass is rooted in your inability to play or even tune it. for whatever reason please do all involved a favor and take some lessons before subjecting anyone else to the retardedness you've so prominently displayed here today.

ps to answer your question, "dropped" B would read as follows: B,F#,b,E,A. if you were to drop standard tuning on a 5 string bass you would be in dropped A(A,E,A,D,G). if that was indeed what you were attempting to ask. best of luck to you.

My bass is tuned A D G C F.but i plan to get a high C n use that instead of the low B

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yah, im just a stupid little 13 year old thats endorsed by spector and has been playing guitar for about 4 years and in a quite succesful band....iwas merely asking a question dick, so FUCK YOU!!!!!

firstly,son, ive been playing about as long as youve been alive, and theres plenty of people here who can shred like nobodys business, so youre boasting about your ability in the wrong place. im sure spector gives out tons of endorsements to guys who cant even tune their instruments.that being said im not going to get into some dick measuring contest about how talented and revered you supposedly are. any animosity directed towards you was merely a result of the ignorant manner in which you presented yourself. if i came off like a collosal asshole you'll have to forgive me as we get asked about drop tuning here roughly 10 times a day.best of luck to you in your musical endeavours. (thats a root beer in your hand there)

yah......im pretty sure that i know how to tune a guitar.......i have just never used or even thought about using a 5 string and had no idea what to do with it......i was saying that i was playting for 4 years and endorsed by spector because that othe dick said i was 13 and not able to play any insturment.....yah, im definately not 13 either.......

i just bought a new set of strings which has a high C instead of a low B so should i make some the trus rod adjustments?

my bass is currently tuned D G C F Bb

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i wouldnt recommend messing with your truss rod unless youre 100% certain what youre doing. if you plan on keeping the high C (as opposed to the low B) you may need to adjust the nut though.

thanx dude..but ive changed back to the low B

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no problem...rock on brother.

Is using a four string bass with heavy strings a good idea to tune to B instead of getting a five string bass, or until I get a five string bass?

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Since no one gave your post a careful read to see that it is actually a legit (well semi-legit, it is a tuning question after all) question, I tell you what I would do.
Right now your 4 string drop B is tuned as follows, (low strings to high): B, F#, B, E.
If you had a five string, it would be a funny situation. If you wanted to use the lowest string as your B string (ie, tune the B string how it is supposed to be tuned), you would have to tune every other string one step up to preserve to same fretting patterns for your songs, like you said. This would mean tons of breaking strings. Or, you could do the other thing you said, tuning everything down by three semi-tones, and further down tuning the two lower strongs by one tone: F#, B, F#, B, E
The problem with this is that that low F# string is designed to be tuned as B and will be sloppy as hell (as was said elsewhere in this thread).
So as a variation of this you could do something that sound really weird but which must be good since Subsonic6string does it: tune every string down 3 semi-tones and tune only the E string (string #4) down an extra tone to get: G#, B, F#, B, E.

I think that's alot of trouble though. If I were you and I was getting a 5 string, I would tune it as follows: B E A D G. Standard. All you would have to do is re-learn your songs with everything that is played on the four high strings moved up by 2 frets. Shouldn't be too hard, especially given that most bands that drop B substitute low loud notes for technical and difficult riffs. Actually I doubt you would benefit much from a 5 string, since you won't extend your range much from how you are currently tuned. The only difference would be that you wouldn't get the sloppy sounds of a bass tuned way too low for its own good.

Sorry for rambling, I didn't mean to go on that long.

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If you tuned yourself to standard with your regular 5 string set you would already be only three semi-tones away from your "tenor bass setup". It seems funny to me that you want higher range but you tune down your bass.

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Thanks, Rattlehead!!!

To get around the sloppiness issue, I took some time to learn about proper setups. It took a bit of time, but by increasing the tension in my trussrods and retuning my intonation, the tension on my strings is pretty well the same as a normal tuned bass would be.

As previously stated, though, it's not something you should try unless you are confident in your abilities...either that, or have a lot of extra money to pay someone professional to fix it...lol

Cheers.

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youll need a serious tuss rod adjustment to convert to BEAD tuning, if you want the low B but dont want a 5 string i would just get one of the esp 4 strings that are built for BEAD

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I think those are called "baritone" basses. Not too sure though.

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They are

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How about this:
The next time a guitar player tells you to drop tune to a C tell him to go fuck himself. Then tune up to a E (maybe Eb) and tell him to write heavier music...

Whoever writes the majority of the riffs should determine the tuning, unless your singer actually sings. If your singer sings, his range determines the tuning of the band.

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You and I are so similar.

Hmmm this is very true though. Although it doesn't work that way for my band. We are always in standard tuning but we only have one song in the key of E! Our singer always sings clean but doesn't use the high octave unless he both can and wants to.

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