Thanks Mark. I got your post a day too late, and I bought the Spirocore variety, so we'll see how they are (I haven't put them on yet). The violin shop guy said that they would have a similar sound to Helicores but more volume, and that the winding on the E string would be prone to unravelling. I'll try the Superflexibles in the next experimental trial. Why do Thomastiks need a shorter bridge?

Slight thread creep, but related:

I've heard here that you should take your instruments in for "setup" at least once a year. My guitar is less than a year old, but my fiddle is a little more so I decided it was time to act on this advice.

I took it back to the shop (Dawson's in Ottawa, which makes/repairs/sells violin family instruments only) and said that I had bought the fiddle there a year ago and wanted to have the setup checked. The owner looked over my fiddle, adjusted the bridge angle and the position of a string on its tuning peg, and said that all was well. This took about two minutes altogether.

Now, I've never taken any instrument in for setup before and I wasn't sure what exactly to expect, but I did expect that it would cost something and take a little more time - a more thorough examination of the soundpost, bridge placement, position of strings on bridge, the action at the nut, and the turnability of the pegs.

Was my experience typical, or do you find it a little strange? I suppose it's possible that everything was perfect in my setup, and that an expert eye can tell at a glance if anything is wrong. But I did wonder if maybe he didn't take my fiddle seriously because it's a student violin.

Marion