Fanned Frets anybody?

[Koreth]

Re: Fanned Frets anybody?

The actual purpose of this principle is simply to combine different scale lengths onto the same neck, increasing the range and musicality of the instrument by lowering tension and speaking length on the higher strings to sweeten up the tone and increasing them on the lower strings to tighten them up. For example the tighter low strings of a strat combined with teh sweeter diskant strings of a Gibson scale.

Idly curious: Couldn't one get a similar effect for much less money by running lighter than normal gauge strings on the high strings and heavier than normal gauge strings on the lower ones? The speaking length doesn't change, but the tension would, assuming the lighter and heavier gauge string set was tuned to the same pitch as a standard one. Is it more the change in tension or the change in speaking length of the string that effects the desired change, or is it a combination of both?