View Full Version : What size nut?
I was wondering what size nut would you guys choose if you were having a custom guitar made?
Joel Eckhaus of Earnest Instruments (http://www.earnestinstruments.com/radiator/) uses the following dimensions:
Neck Width at nut
4-String: 1 1/8″
5-String: 1 7/16″
I own a 5 string electric (conversion) by Joel. His work as a luthier is informed by decades of R&D on the subject of Tenor Guitars, and any contemporary consideration of TG instrument specs would probably want to take Joel's work into account.
Thanks, I know the standard size is 32mm at the nut but I was thinking this goes right back to the 1920s when the guitar was designed to match the tenor banjo. It is just that I was thinking it might be beneficial to widen the width a few mm?
I bit more room for chord playing... just a question really... :)
bruce.b
Mar-23-2014, 4:30pm
Yes, 1 1/8" for 4 strings. A narrow and slim neck is great for playing fast melody. 1 1/4" would be fine too, and maybe what you want if you mostly play chords. I have both widths and prefer the narrow one. It wouldn't be a deal breaker for me as long as it was no wider than 1 1/4" if I liked the rest of the guitar.
It is an important decision for me, although I have 8 weeks before my build starts, its just that I have a baritone ukulele with a 38mm nut width (1.5") & it certainly makes more room for top of the neck chords.
I am hoping my new guitar will be an instrument for life & I don't want to regret any decisions... perhaps a compromise in between the two?
bruce.b
Mar-23-2014, 4:58pm
My advice would be to go for 1 1/4" It feels plenty wide once you get used to it. When I occasionally play my tenor with that width (I almost exclusively play my Herb Taylor with 1 1/8) it feels really wide to me. I originally started with baritone uke so I know how you feel..... 1 1/8 seems really narrow! One thing, I have thin fingers, not sure if that matters much.
I am sure you are right Bruce...
FatBear
Apr-16-2014, 12:52pm
It seems to me that if you want a tenor guitar for playing chords you might as well get a six string which is actually made for that. The tenor seems better as a melody instrument to me, but that's only one novice's opinion.
I have a mandolin with 1-1/4" nut, which is on the wide side. I also have a baritone ukulele that I bought cheap so I could "try out" the longer scale length of a tenor guitar fretboard before spending a lot of money to buy one. But I also got a wider string spacing, too. To me the baritone seems extremely wide and I look forward to getting the tenor guitar with closer strings. I keep missing the pesky things on the baritone and I just cannot play it very fast at all. And it's even worse when I put on a capo because the "nut" width becomes effectively even wider. Granted, I'm not very good on any instrument, but I really do find it much easier to play melody on the mandolin than on the baritone ukulele.
I did try playing chords on the baritone before I restrung it in 5ths and found that they were far easier to play than on the mandolin. That was a real eye-opener to me as I finally started to understand why this instrument is better for this style of playing and that instrument is better for that style.
One thing I am planning to have on mine is a zero fret. That way it should be very easy to change strings to different tunings without having problems with the nut slots being too loose or too tight.
Thanks for your input fatbear :)
Of course you are right to a point but I love mixing in strum patterns on my tenors! I have various 4 & 6 string instruments but I love to pick on my 6 strings too!
I have some more specialist tenor guitars too like this one with only 5 frets.....
http://i654.photobucket.com/albums/uu261/foxfish_photo/image-34.jpg (http://s654.photobucket.com/user/foxfish_photo/media/image-34.jpg.html)