Official Luthiers Forum!

Okay, I will then! 

Why are the standard nut and neck widths of a SS guitar the sizes that they are? I guess, more to the point, why are they as narrow as they are?  The reason I ask is that I have tried to learn how to play guitar several times over the years, and never have learned.  The main reason that I stop trying is that I can never seem to get clean chord, no matter how hard I try.  The only way I can do it is to hold my fingers totally perpendicular to the fret board and push with my nails.  That just seems to be way too awkward to play comfortably.   The puzzling thing is that I don't have particularly big fingers which makes me ask, why are the strings so close together?

I know that players are used to certain size and shaped necks, so that is part of why it is done, and also builders tend to try and copy existing proven designs.  Also, I know that you can't get too far apart because fingers are just so long and if it gets too wide, the reach gets too long.  It just seems to me that wider nuts work in the classical community, why did the width change for SS guitars?   I know wider nuts and string spacing would possibly make learning easier for me, and I would guess I am not alone. 

I hope my question is clear. I guess my question is why are the strings so close together, and who decided that the nut/strings must be a certain size.  Please don't slap me too hard for such a dumb question, but I haven't been able to find a good reason searching online. 

Oh, and before someone says "try making a guitar with a wider nut/neck and see", I am doing that now.   I am finishing a 12 fret OOO and have a 52mm nut width. It may be totally un-playable but I will feel better knowing I tried and failed!  And besides, the narrow string spacing is totally unplayable for me anyways so I gotta try something!

Okay, I will go and hang my head in shame now for asking such a 'noob' question.

David?-
No real answers from me, as I am a poor player myself...however...
Your idea about making a wider-neck guitar is one good solution. You could also get a cheap classical and do some experiments as well.
Have you taken lessons from a good teacher? Sometimes a bit of 'hands on' instruction can open some doors. It may be an issue of technique (or nail length- you usually don't get your left hand nails anywhere very close to the strings), or the action setting on your guitar.
No doubt some of the expert pickers here will chime in with better suggestions.

Cheers
John

52 is close to the width of a classical.  Seems I have seen some slothead steel strings with nuts that wide.  Seems like it should be fine.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

No offense, but I believe your playing problems could be addressed better by a professional guitar teacher. There's no reason, aside from a physical disability, that you can't learn to play chords with the common string spacings.

IMO,the only way this would have been dumb is if you would never have asked the question.

Good luck!

_________________
JJ
Napa, CA
http://www.DonohueGuitars.com

No, I haven't had a professional teacher and I am sure that would help a lot.  I have just had friends who play try and help me, and of course I have tried on my own using videos, books and CD's.  I know that 52mm is close to classical size, that is why I am trying it on my newest build.  It is a slot head 12 fret so asthectially it looks fine.  It is just a bit wider than the plans specify. 

The main reason I ask, other than for personal curiosity, is that as a builder, I would like to know what players want and why.  It is tough to understand playability of a guitar that I built when I don't play myself.  More importantly, what feels un-playable to me seems like it would be perfectly playable to a good player.  My daughter plays and she says that my guitars feel and play great, but I just don't see it.  That is why I want to learn to play, even if not very well.  Then I will at least know what a guitar with good playablity feels like, instead of going by strict measurements and assuming that it is playable.

Whew, that is a lot of using the word 'playable' in one post!

My suggestion would be to trim your nails and use the pads of the fingertips. Much easier on a steel string, in my opinion.   My other suggestion is to practice your chord making more. In the beginning we all had trouble touching and deadening adjacent strings. After a while you will wonder what was so hard about it. One day it will just happen, if you keep practicing. Took me forever to make an "f" position chord cleanly.   If the guitar is for you, the nut can be whatever size you want it to be, however, if you might pick up a friends guitar someday or try one out in a music store, it would be good to be able to play it on a normally spaced nut.

Ron

_________________
OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

David,
Not meaning to be personal, but do your hands resemble a catcher's mitt? My brother can reach an octave and a half without stretching. Wonderful on the piano, but not so much on the guitar. My point is, bigger hands (or fat fingers)need more spacing. Newton plays into all this, you know that bit about no two object can occupy the same space at the same time.

_________________
Aoibeann

Fingerpickers sometimes use up to 1 7/8" for nut width..or wider. you can make the width whatever feels best to you.

My guess is that when the neck on SS were narrowed, it was because chording was much easier ( capo v fingering all chords) and most of the songs were written with easier chords?

I can't get along with narrow string spacing either if I'm playing fingerstyle so my necks tend to be on the wide side unless someone asks for a specific width. As a matter of interest, I measured a National Resophonic tricone and it was about 8.5 mm between string centres giving a 50mm nut. That would be considered normal by a National owner, so don't feel that you have to play a narrow neck if you're not comfortable with it.

Ron is right, though, if you're going to play guitar you need really short nails on your fretting fingers.

_________________
Pete
http://www.petewoodmanguitars.com

As the calouses develop, usually you get better at avoiding the adjacent string.

David,

I think the first year I played was mostly learning how to hold a guitar. There's a huge subtle difference in the angle of your (fretting hand) wrist as well as the thumb position behind the neck. It has to feel right and be comfortable for you, regardless if it conforms to someone else's idea of *perfect* hand position. Your fretting hand should not hold the guitar; your body and strumming/picking arm should handle that job entirely. Beginners also tend to rotate the guitar so they can see the frets, which quintuples how hard the fretting hand/wrist has to work.

Find a shade tree far away from any other humans (so you won't be self-conscious), and play. Don't start off with difficult chords! They'll frustrate you. For example, if you want to strum some 3 chord songs, like maybe G, D, A, then try to make the A chord using 3 fingertips rather than trying to (immediately) learn to barre those 3 strings with your ring finger. (I still buzz when I try an A with a ring finger barre - after playing 35 years!) Another thought is to start off with single note scales, going across the neck, rather than starting with rhythm strumming.

Right when I was getting started, some well-intentioned knucklehead gave me a Mickey Baker jazz guitar book, and there were chords on the first or second page that my hand simply refused to do. I never learned how to play those chords.

If you set an honest and realistic goal that one year from now, you'll be able to comfortably hold a guitar to allow your fretting hand to fret strings pretty cleanly, (and if you practice at least a couple of hours a week), I bet you'll get there. You may love and prefer your new wide neck, but as you say, you'd like to be able to "test drive" the guitars you build with relatively standard string spacing.

Hope this helps. Good luck and don't forget to have fun!

Dennis

_________________
Dennis Leahy
Duluth, MN, USA
7th Sense Multimedia

Thanks for the comments.  For all the posters saying to trim my nails, well I am a nail biter so too long nails have never been a problem for me!    My hands don't have that catchers mitt look either, and I know exactly what you are talking about.  My hands are actually kind of small as are my fingers.  The reason I said I use my nails is it seems that is the only way I can push the strings and not flatten the pads of my fingers so much that they hit the other strings.  I am an electrical contractor and work construction, so my hands are quite caloused but maybe my fingertips aren't caloused in the right places.

I guess I need to just keep at it and like everything else in life, it will come, like riding a bike.  The purpose of my post wasn't to get suggestions of how I can play better, although reading my initial post I can see how you would think that.  The purpose of my post was to get some of the reasons of why the spacing is what it is.  I have built 4 guitars now, and although people who have played them say they feel right, I would like to understand how I as a non-player can build a neck that others will say 'feels right'.  I don't know what feels right so it is difficult to know if what I make is a good neck or not, other than by going with strict measurements, and feeling the back of the neck. 

I know that there are a lot of builders who don't play out there, and I would like to understand how they can build a neck, and know that it is a playable neck.  It could be as simple as just taking copius measurements and as long as they are correct, the neck is right.  I just know that a lot of what I have read and heard is that playing is more about the feel of the guitar than anything else.  I am trying to figure out how a non-player can know that they have gotten that 'feel' when building.

I hope that makes sense.  Rattling around in my mind it makes perfect sense, but according to my wife, sometimes that rattling is possibly a rock!

Most classical guitar builders have standardized on a 52-53mm string spacing so your 12 fret 52mm is pretty much spot on for a classical. Have you tried a classical guitar? You may find that for your hand that it plays much easier than a steel string.

Because the majority of classical guitar playing is all fingerstyle (there is some strumming and such for chords) it is important that there be sufficient spacing between strings so the notes that are played are separate and distinct.

You may find that if you try a classical guitar strung with high tension strings that it will feel closer to what you are used to with steel strings but with a string spacing that works better for you.

David, how high is your action on the guitar you are using? That certainly makes it hard to hold strings down. What guage strings are use using? Switch to a lighter guage.

Ron

_________________
OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

I have small hands - sausage fingers - and an inability to learn things "the right way"
{however that last one is getting better in old age}.
It took me a long time to play alot of chords cleanly, some voicings I never was able to really be able to hit cleanly, on the fly, in a tight manner, in an up tempo - So I learned as many alternate voicings for each chord as I possibly could and learned as many voicings that utilized open strings as possible as well.
Not only over time did I learn all the chords a guy could ever need to play whatever he wanted to - I also developed a relatively novel sound and style{IMHO}.
There are different ways to skin a cat and all that is really required is a bit of dedication... I had teachers tell me point blank that I was never going to learn the guitar to any degree of note, mind you that was the 70's and the predominanat thinking at the time was you needed certain fingers to play guitar or piano adequately.... luckily I was never one to learn things in the "right way"...
Besides one of the best players I ever heard was a sausage fingered guy.... My all time hero Lenny Breau wasnt exactly lengthy in the digits either!
Cheers
Charliewood
PS admittedly, I have also played classical guitars at times, but I was never big on the mellow sound, and wanted to play electric predominantly (more often clean than not though) up until 9 years or so ago..
It was then that I began to mellow...and acoustic guitars began to appeal to me more in my sense of artistic expression.

as a player who will never make anyone's head turn in admiration(disgust at unmusical noise perhaps, yes) at the level of my virtuosity, the two things i learned during my brief career as a formal degree seeking music student which most improved my playing were to take things slowly, and not to try to push the string through the fb.

being able to fluently change chords is a matter of muscle memory, and the things which the muscles have to remember for you to be successful must be correct things. so slow down and make the chord changes very, painfully, ridiculously, boringly, slow, but make them correctly, cleanly. unless you do it cleanly it won't make a bit of difference how wide the fb is, you will miss and noise will be the result. once you can do the change that slowly in a clean fashion, then try it one degree faster. this applies to every chord change.

if you push to hard, and your comments re flattening the ends of your fingers sound as though your are, the hand is stressed, the muscles get stiff, and fluent changes are impossible. the pressure only has to be sufficient to make the string break cleanly over the fret; it doesn't have to even touch the fb. experiment a bit to learn how lightly you can fret the string and get clean notes. you will be surprized how little pressure is really needed.

whilst having the first joint of the finger in a vertical position makes it easier to fret cleanly, there are many players who do rather well without it. take a look at b.b. king for instance.

and remember how long it took you to just walk without stumbling regularly and falling on your face. if you can't remember your own efforts think of your kid's efforts. it took a few years. then to become a skilled athlete, quite a few more. the same is true for learning an instrument. it just does not happen quickly, at least not for mere mortals.

[QUOTE=davidmor]Why are the standard nut and neck widths of a SS guitar the sizes that they are?[/QUOTE]

The simple answer is that they seem to work OK for most people for most types of playing most of the time. True, some people have smaller and some have larger hands and they will benefit from necks that fit better, but most good players can easily play a standard neck with ease.

Have you ever looked at a mandolin neck or a violin neck, which is even skinnier? For people who do not play it looks impossible that grown men could fit their fingers and get clear notes from instruments with such miniscule necks. And as anyone with a kid who takes violin lessons in the house will tell you, it takes a lot of work, patience and determination to get clear notes out of that tiny box. Yet, once you become friends with the instrument it turns out that the string intervals, the width of the nut and the geometry of the neck, everything makes perfect sense for the type of tones you can expect to coax out of it. Same thing with the guitar; don't expect it to happen overnight, just keep on trying and enjoy your progress.   After a while you get to the point where you don't have to think about it -- that's when you can concentrate on making music.

_________________
Rian Gitar og Mandolin

David - Greetings!

Alot of good advice going here, I have no fingernails or rather trimmed very short on my chording hand (left) and long fingernails on my picking hand (not like a girl, just longer to pick). Ron is right, most folks press to hard on the string thinking a rattle or buzz is created if they don't, when in reality how the finger contacts the string is equally important. It takes some time to develop calouses on your finger tips, once this occurs it is much easier to position and press the strings. Most beginners feel very cramped in the string spacing initially, likewise every chord is a challenge, but I assure you if you stick with it, the spacing seems to get wider, the pain goes away and you chord clean. Practice, Patience and more Practice.

Interesting perspective for guitar makers to not play. I can see how that could and would create some issues. I am curious as to how a non-player "hears" a guitar or understands playability?

Mike

Yes the comments are encouraging.  No the OOO 12 is not my first build, it is my 4th and it is a scratch build.  I am doing some experimenting with it such as parabolic bracing and the wider neck.  I will keep it for myself and my goal is to have an instrument that I will feel comfortable playing so I don't get frustrated and quit.  All of my guitars are strung with D'Addario phospher bronze lights.  Maybe I should go to extra lights.

After reading all of these replies I got inspired.  In between coats of lacquer on the OOO, I dug out my dreadnought, sat down and strummed a "G" chord over and over again going from open to G to open over and over again.  I did this for an hour or so and by the end, I was pretty excited that I was able to fret the chord cleanly while keeping a slow beat and alternating from G to open without looking at my fretting hand.  One thing that clicked was something that Dennis said.  He said that most beginners tend to hold the guitar so they can see the frets which makes fretting much more difficult because of the wrist and finger angle.  As soon as I read this, I immediately said to myself, "that is what I am doing".  I changed how I was holding it so I couldn't see the frets and it did make the angle on my wrist much more comfortable.  It also made it easier to curve my fingers in a way that made fretting cleanly easier.  Now hopefully I will be able to do it again tomorrow!

Although this thread didn't go exactly in the direction I was looking for, I am glad it went the way it did.   I learned something that I haven't heard before and that in my extremely limited experience seems to have helped.  I have become hooked on building, so I need to learn how to play so I can justify this affliction I have!   I also feel that if I know how to play, even if poorly, it will make me a better builder.

As for what I was really looking for, I think that got answered too.  Nut and neck widths are sized the way they are, because that is just the standard and what players expect when they play.  I guess it would get pretty inconvenient if every builder made the neck whatever width they wanted with no regard for what other builders are doing.  As for my neck building, until I can get a feel for what makes a good neck, I will depend on precise measurements, and maybe I will purchase some of those new neck gauges that have become available.

Mike, your last sentance is exactly what I was trying to get at with this post.  I know that there are a lot of builders who don't play yet they make fantastic instruments.  If playing isn't in the cards for me, I am curious how non-players learn playability, and even what to listen for.  A guitar is more than just a bunch of wood, glue, and strings.  It also has something more to it that unless I play it, I will never totally understand.  That is what I am trying to figure out, how the non-playing builders learn to build a good instrument with that 'soul', without knowing how to play it.  I am sure that getting critiques from players is a huge part of the learning process, as well as building experience, but it seems to me that there is more to it than just this.

Maybe I am over-thinking this.

I learned how to play guitar on a classical guitar although I played it like a SS (strumming that is). It was also kind of nice because the strings were a bit easier on the fingers as well. Let us know how this one turns out if you go for it.

Christian

_________________
Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils - Louis Hector Berlioz

Chansen / C hansen / C. Hansen / Christian Hansen - not a handle.

Christian

Hi:
     I built a twelve fret 000 with a two inch nut for myself and I love it. I feel my fingertips are shaped like a mushroom (can't do a clean A chord on a standard neck!). The fat neck is the answer, so what if no one else likes it. Thats why they call it a custom guitar... enjoy!

P.S. I'm an electrical contractor also, maybe its job related?

_________________
The Biggest Little City, Nevada
www.hammondguitars.com
I love building guitars!

It really boils down to technique.  I have big hands, and even on a classical, I sometimes have problems, but I know it is my technique.  Anyone ever looked at Andres Segovia's hands?  You'd think he would have a major problem.  If he did at any point, he overcame it.  That said, my son, who has hands like mine (big, semi-long fingers on big hands} has no problem getting clean notes when fingerpicking on a steel string or playing lead or rhythm on an electric.  He just learned the best technique for his hands.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

I have to say; being a finger style player I like a 1-7/8" nut. But that said; the 1-3/4" and 1-11/16" nuts were and adaptation to what the market desired These two measurement seam to be the comfortable spread for most adults without cause in unwanted sympathetic harmonic responses by non fretted strings and the ability of the player to cleanly fret the majority of chords. It is pretty much the same reason Steel string fretboards are convexed. It worked the best for the widest range of players.

However that is the wonderful thing about a custom built guitar. Just like with golf clubs a custom fit improves the players abilities by proper fit if needed.

My two cents on your issues fretting some chords; No chord you learn is easy with out practice, and it takes much less practice with good hand position and proper touch. I have seen many students complain of the same issues you speak of. the most common two cause of their problems were easily traced to improper fret hand position and excessive tension. Once proper hand position is achieved it takes far less wrist strength and finger pressure to cleanly fret a chord. and like with any skill bad position leads to poor practice and poor practice leads to poor technique.

I obviously I don't know your technique, and am not implying you have bad technique. But your issues are not uncommon issues with self taught player and new students. There really is no substitute for professional instruction. It can take a decent self taught player and turn them into an accomplished in half the time.

Every great musician has (not have had, but has) a mentor/teacher.

One last thing in case I am right about what is causing your problems. The truth is is is much harder to unlearn bad habits than it is to learn good ones. especially so if you do not have the knowledge base to know one from the other.

lots of typos in my post I hope you could read through them