String Gauges for Darick Campbell Sacred Steel Tuning

[Noah Stid]

Hi Steel guitar forum!

I've been trying to get darick campbell's sound from his legendary homespun lesson video. I'm having a hard time buying string sets that sound good. Someone at the thread below said Darick uses as low as a .078 for the low B. I recently bought a whole set of singles from the forum store of various gauges t try them out and tried putting some super low strings gauges on the bottom three strings (I think I had a .076, .070 and .060) and it sounds super bad haha like playing cowboy chords on a bass guitar. I have the same Sierra lap steel Darick uses in his video, which makes me feel like the strings are not that low, because it doesn't sound like that to my ear in his lesson.

I want to play his style with the tuning below. Anyone have advice on the string gauges for the below strings? I realize there are already gauge charts out there but they don't seem to be working out so would love some advice.


E
C# (sometimes D)
B
G#
E
B
E
B(sometimes D)



Info on Darick's Tuning from old Post:
https://steelguitarforum.com/Forum2/HTML/001861.html

[Allan Revich]

These are the string gauges as suggested by John Ely here,
https://www.hawaiiansteel.com/graphics/ ... _chart.pdf

E .014
C# .017
B .018
G# .024
E .030
B .038
E .056
B .068

Might be a good starting point.

[Glenn Wilde]

You could try to contact Homespun and see if Darick would share that info, or find him on social media.
Well, it seems he has passed on, so RIP. Still, Homespun might help.

[Michael Kiese]

Aloha Noah,

Darrick used a Slim Jim for his lowest string. The dang thing was so thick. lol.

That lowest string is so low that it's mostly used for effect and it's so thick that it will likely throw off the flat plain of your bar along the strings.

I would highly recommend just focusing on his top strings and get his melodic ideas. His tuning is basically an E6 with the root up top, with a set of power chords on the bottom.

Since you have the same Sierra Steel as him, you're likely 90% there.

Instead of going down the rabbit hole with strings 7 and 8, just focus and learn the top 6.

Strings 7 and 8 are bass player territory, anyways. If you get too used to using them and start playing in bands, you'll be competing with the Bass player, which is no bueno.

Just my 2¢.

Enjoy!