@Fiddlerman I have a question, are really old but never used gut strings useable? I am using FM strings, and love them! I always thought it would be fun to try gut strings and hear how my "Rose" sounded when my grandfather played her! He used silk E strings which are impossible to get now. I assume that was due to straight gut E strings broke rapidly! Anyone know why silk strings went out of fashion? Was it due to WWII? Maybe the end of the war and all the bombing put a lot of silk string makers out of business? I googled silk violin strings and all I get are about spidersilk strings, which are experimental. Nothing about silk strings made with traditional silk is even mentioned! However, I have a package for a silk E string that is obviously Japanese. I am aware that most of these pkgs could pre-date WWI, I have no idea when he quit playing. He told me he was too young to inlist for WWI and too old to inlist for WWII. He courted my  grandmother with Rose when they were 16 until they were 19 and married! I am not sure how much longer they played together, but they had the farm, the depression, and two daughters to deal with, which could have been a reason to put their instruments away.

@Fiddlerman @Mark I found a maker of Silk Violin strings! I found a picture of a Japanese guzheng with silk strings which took me to a lyre with silk strings. So I did a search for silk strings for the guzheng, and ran into a post about this place you could find silk strings for western and eastern instruments. He sells on Etsy. His shop name is LPKaster. If you google etsy.com.LPKaster, you will find the link to his shop. It is considered to be as fine as gut and very similar in sound. It is hand wound and supposed to have wonderful nuances to the sound. (Learned all that from the Lyre player) He sells E, A, D and G strings in 60 inch lengths, which is the same as my grandfather's silk E string. He says you should be able to get 3 strings out of that length. For 3 strings, the price is very reasonable.  They are priced by weight or by how many strands of silk are required. E is cheapest and G is the most expensive. Still at $36.00 for 3 G strings, is not bad! Maybe someone would be interested in trying silk strings out. He started making them for a specific violinist in the Philharmonic Orchestra. Now he makes them for everyone. He also does custom orders, all sizes for $28.00. Check it out! At the high price of gut string, the silk may be a good option! I am thinking that they may take a week to settle like gut. It seems silk was used since ancient times for stringed instruments in the east.