I'm restoring an old zither, and had to take all the wrest pins out. Now I need to put on the new strings, and then tune them all.

How far OUT should they be to allow for three turns of string around the pin for fixing, and then allow for tuning? Is there a rule or guide, or do I just have to experiment, and risk chewing up some hard to obtain strings?

Thanks for any help or advice on this.

I would put them in and leave about a 1/4" of thread above the unblock, maybe as mcuh as 1/2" if the string is long and the string length is on the shorter side. I don't cut my strings to length. I leave them full length and just wind them on. Zithers are different from guitars, banjos, and autoharps. With steel strings, winding three times around the most os fine. Zither strings are composite and you want to preserve the integrity of the string and the windings.

Ken Bloom
http://boweddulcimer.org

Thank you. It's working!