Nut Width, String Spacing

[longneck]

Hello, All;
I've been looking at getting another Mandolin (life's hard) and see that the Eastman MD 315 has a nut width of 1 3/16" and a string spacing of 1 5/8". This means that the string spacing is 7/16" wider than the nut. How can the string spacing be wider
than the nut that holds them? It can't. So that means I'm not understanding how they measure string spacing. Or maybe nut width. And nut width I figure is the max width of the nut, NOT the dimension of outside E to outside G strings... (Spacing?). Any help you can give would be appreciated.

Thanks

[Dale Ludewig]

They're talking about the outside width of the strings at the bridge.

[acousticphd]

Nut width on Eastman mandolins is published as "nominally" 1-3/32".
They've used this description from the beginning and never updated it, which I've always found strange. It gives the impression that they don't exactly know, or aren't exactly sure, or (maybe) aren't necessarily even trying to be exact. It might be a poor choice for the English translation (?). To me the necks have always felt even narrower, like 1-1/16", but I haven't played one in a while.

There are a few outright mistakes in some the specs given on their website.

[longneck]

Ah Ha! at the bridge... Thanks, Dale.

[longneck]

... outright mistakes in some of the specs... wonder what else slips thru...
Tnx, Jeff

[Folkmusician.com]

The main problem with specs, is that they are constantly changing, and rarely updated across the web. I guarantee that a good portion of sites are still listing specs and copy from 10 years ago.

Current Eastman necks are not the same as they were a few years ago. If you have them both in your hands, you can feel the additional girth in the newer versions. They do spec at 1-3/32" to 1-1/8". Eastman's tend to have wider string spacing (at the nut) than many of the competitors with a 1-1/8 nut. Eastman does a good job with the string spacing.

All of the mandolins I deal with undergo constant small changes. Sometimes one off. It is the nature of small run, handmade products. Guitars are different as there is so much more automation and they are larger runs. This also means more parts and materials in stock, resulting in more consistency.

Many of these mandolins are only made like 5-20 at a time. It would be rare that there were 100 made at once, unless you are into the more production line cheap mandolins. Even then, 100 would be a lot for most of the models.