Rotosound String Cleaner review

  • £12.95
By Dave Burrluck
( Guitarist )
published
The Rotosound clips neatly onto your strings like so…

MusicRadar Verdict

A neat little addition to your case or gigbag that, if used directly after playing, will certainly clean and prolong the life of your strings.

Pros

  • +

    Gadget-style concept; cleans lightly soiled strings well.

Cons

  • -

    Not as good as a solution-based system for heavily gunked strings.

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If we had a pound for every string-cleaning product available today we'd be able to buy, well… quite a few sets of new strings.

This latest system in both guitar and bass versions is quite a magnanimous gesture from the UK's top string-maker, Rotosound, who you might have thought wouldn't want us to extend the life of our strings so we buy more! Indeed, it claims to "revitalise used, old and damaged strings" and to "extend the life and preserves the tone of guitar strings".

The device is simple enough. Two micro-fibre pads are fixed to a credit card-sized, hinged two-piece plastic assembly. You unclip the two pads, slide under your strings, clip back together and then run it up and down your strings, which it is claimed "provides 360 degrees of string cleaning action".

In Use

Rotosound says there's no solution needed for this system - unlike the majority of other systems - so in reality, it's not the best to clean really gunked up strings days after your last gig.

Used directly after playing, however, or on strings that have had a little use, yes, it cleans them nicely. But then again, so would a quick rub with any clean dry cloth, wouldn't it?

Dave Burrluck
Dave Burrluck

Dave Burrluck is one of the world’s most experienced guitar journalists, who started writing back in the '80s for International Musician and Recording World, co-founded The Guitar Magazine and has been the Gear Reviews Editor of Guitarist magazine for the past two decades. Along the way, Dave has been the sole author of The PRS Guitar Book and The Player's Guide to Guitar Maintenance as well as contributing to numerous other books on the electric guitar. Dave is an active gigging and recording musician and still finds time to make, repair and mod guitars, not least for Guitarist’s The Mod Squad.