The Steel Guitar
Information Resource

Your guitar comes from the manufacturer balanced to specific strings and gauges. Changing gauges or brands may require some adjustments to the travel, action and balance of the various pulls.

The modified Ernie Ball Pedal Steel Guitar Custom Set Making Guide chart below will serve as a guide for making up custom sets of strings for a pedal steel guitar. The gauges are based on the ability of a string to retain its memory accurately over time.

You should select the string based on the highest pitch to which the string will be pulled when a pedal or knee lever is used.