Wider string space at the nut - GF-25 (edit)

[Dirt123]

I picked up nut bone nut & saddle blanks for my GF-25, I've been wanting to replace the plastic for some time now.

I would like a little more space at the nut for my fat fingered playing style (I use the term "style" loosely). I've played lots of OM & vintage-type guitars, & like a 1-3/4 inch wide neck-at-the-nut.

I figure that if I squeeze out the string spacing a 32nd of an inch on the high & low E-stings, I might get a little more wiggle room. (I've heard of this mod being performed in skinny-necked Rick 12 strings).

Has anybody else tried this? What pitfalls might I expect? I am a bit worried about the nut being a little weak on the sides.

Dirt

 

[GardMan]

The '71 D-44 I bought last fall came with very narrow string spacing... ~35 mm (E to E), as I recall. As part of it's setup, I had my luthier cut me a new nut, widening out the strings a bit (can't remember... think he took them to 37 mm E to E). While it did make it easier to play overall, there are a couple things to worry about:

On the low E, you worry about rolling the string off the edge of the fret. Look at the fret and where the string will hit it... don't get too close to where the fret is beveled down at the end, or you might have issues (seems to be more of a problem if you play a lot in dropped D, DADGAD, or other tunings where that string is more slack, or if you do a lot of bending). This hasn't proven a problem for me... but it might if you have significant bevel on the ends of your frets.

On the other end... if you bring the high E to close to the edge of the fretboard, you might find that you accidently damp it when reaching over to certain chord positions. I found that I now have to be more conscious of my hand position, and wish I have left just a smidge more room on the high E side. At some point, I may recut a new nut to move the high E a bit more inboard (in ~0.5mm would help).
Dave

 

[chicagowineguy]

Excellent observations, Dave...and very timely since I'm going to have a new nut cut for the D25 and am planning on slightly wider spacing for the same reason...just a little more room for fingerpicking. I'm thinking it's bound to be a plus for me since I consider the neck so comfortable already...a miniscule adjustment at the nut isn't going to make barreing (sp?) more difficult...is it?

 

[GardMan]

CWG,
I don't find barring the wider spacing more difficult. Somewhat surprisingly, its things like a C chord which have an open high E... if I am lazy and let my hand relax too much while reaching over to fret the 5th (or 6th if alternating base) string, I sometimes mute the open high E.
Dave

 

[Dirt123]

Thanks, Dave. Those are 2 things I didn't think about. I 'll take them into consideration - maybe I won't go out quite as far as I planed.

Dirt

 

[cjd-player]

I put a wider nut on my D-55. Worked out great. Here's a quote from an old post of mine.

I had the day off so I finally replaced the nut on my D-55 with one with wider spacing. A recent post about a new nut on a D-50 showed that lots of you have had a more widely-spaced nut put on a Guild dred. I wanted wider spacing but I didn't want the hassle and expense of files to cut new one myself to try out the spacing. So I purchased a preslotted Tusq nut from Graphtech.

I just want to pass on that the Tusq nut PQ-6134-00 has worked out very well. The E-to-E spacing is 1.496 inches (38.00 mm), and that feels very comfortable to me. Its about 0.070 inch wider than the original E-to-E. They have some with even wider E-to-E spacing, but I would be concerned about getting too close to the edges of the fretboad.

Getting the original nut out of the guitar was the hardest part. The nut is in a slot between the fretboard and headstock veneer, and the neck was finished after the nut was installed. So I had to score the finish along the headstock side and all around the ends with an X-Acto knife. It was glued in pretty solidly and was hard to tap out. Once it was out, I cleaned the slot and then filed and sanded the Tusq nut to fit. I had to take about 0.010 inch off of the back face and about 0.020 inch off of the bottom. Then about 0.010 inch off of the treble end and about 0.020 inch off the bass end.

It was a nice snug fit, and I tightened the strings and have been playing away. I really like the wider string spacing, as many others have said. Next time I change strings I'll probably glue it in. For now, the strings are just holding it in place.

I'll anticipate the question and say that no, I have not noticed a difference in tone between the Tusq and the original bone. Now that I know what string spacing I want I may make a bone one someday to have a harder material, but for now it seems just fine.

 

[bluepen]

I didn't think that it would make a difference (and for some it doesn't), but I much prefer the 1-3/4 width. I haven't done this on my D-50 but have on another guitar. I had the shop guy put in a 1-3/4 nut, then sand/file down the excess. I agree with GardMan, 100%. I'm a bass heavy player, so I "biased" the wider nut toward the treble end but I think I went too far...I do run into some muting issues on the e string.

My D-50 neck is 43 mm wide at the nut, the 1-3/4" tusq nuts have a 38mm E to e spacing, that leaves 5mm of spacing to split between the top and bottom strings and the neck edges. I'd go with no less than 2mm spacing from the neck edge to the e string. The above mentioned modification has only 1.5 mm, not enough.

2.5 mm on each would split the difference...

 

[Dirt123]

OK, great advice for everybody.

I finished up the nut and new saddle over the weekend, long story short, it works well. I used unbleached cow bone. I used the Dan Earlwine Guitar \Player Repair Guide as a reference:

http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Books,_plan ... Guide.html

I need to get the 3rd edition, with the DVD.

Long story long:

The nut string spacing E-to-E is 1-1/2 inches, which puts them pretty close to the edge, but so far is manageable. The string to string spacing worked out as this:

E-to-B: .028"
B-to-G: .029"
G-to-D: .030"
D-to A: .031"
A-to-E: .032"

The saddle is lowered from the stock saddle by almost 1/16", which is getting pretty low. The GF-25 needs a neck reset, but I think I'm good for a while. The action at the 12th fret is still kind of high, 3/16th of an inch, but playable. I compensated the B string to the rear of the saddle to improve intonation.

The bone seems to really have improved the tone - both the highs and lows seem more pronounced.

Nuff said.