Wide Neck Guitars for BIG Hands or Classical Feel

Wide neck guitars are a good option if:

1. You have BIG hands and struggle with pressing (or muting) strings because regular guitars are too narrow or small
2. You are accustomed to classical guitar string spacing, but regular guitars are too narrow

There are ready-made options out there from other companies, but they can come with their own downfalls:

• Nut width is still not wide enough (we've only seen nut widths up to about 48mm, whereas a standard classical guitar nut width is 52mm ~ 2")
• Overall build quality leaves much to be desired (less than $350 for a brand new guitar can only get you so much)

We offer touring grade production model wide neck electric guitars and we build them as custom one-offs as well. We want to share one such guitar with you today because it was a really stand-out guitar!

Check out our wide neck guitars:

OCTAVIA WIDE NECK GUITAR (NATURAL FINISH)

OCTAVIA WIDE NECK GUITAR (METALLIC RED)

This custom 6-string guitar was ordered through our Guitar Customization Tool. Full specs are down below, but here are some of the key areas that were crucial to customize and pay special attention to:

• Nut Width: 54mm Nut ~ 2-1/8" (approx 9.525mm spacing between strings at the nut)
• Bridge: ABM Single Saddle Guitar Bridges (approx 12.70mm spacing between strings at the bridge)
• Pickups: 7-string DiMarzio Evolution Humbuckers and 7-string DiMarzio Blaze Single Coil
• Fingerboard Radius: Flat

Regarding the Nut Width:

The customer opted for a 54mm nut, which is a little wider than a standard classical guitar (52mm). This meant a complete redesign of the fretboard dimensions to allow for the proper Fretboard Overhang (distance between the center of the outermost string to the edge of the fretboard).

Regarding the Bridge:

The vast majority of electric guitar bridges have fixed string spacing, or very minimal string spacing adjustability. Those bridges won't work for this kind of guitar. Fortunately, single saddle guitar bridges exist, which allow us to choose any string spacing we want. These bridges are a little more expensive, and a little more complicated to install and ground, but that's okay. We need them and they do the job amazingly!

Regarding the Pickups:

Why did we install 7-string pickups in a 6-string guitar? Well, the vast majority of 6-string electric guitar pickups have fixed pickup pole spacing, and that means the magnetic field is at a fixed width. This particular wide neck guitar has a much wider string spacing, and so requires a pickup with a much wider pickup pole spacing and magnetic field in order for all the strings to have balanced output. If we installed a normal 6-string pickup, it would cause an issue with output: the outermost strings would have a relatively weak output compared to the innermost strings. That's not okay. Some might ask, "why not just install a rail-style 6-string pickup?" This wasn't an option, either, because this particular guitar's string spacing was wider than 6-string rail-style pickups, too! The customer decided to go function over form with this build and so we installed 7-string pickups and the results were great: balanced output across all strings, and world-class DiMarzio tones!

Regarding the Radius:

Most classical guitars have either a flat fingerboard radius or a very large radius in comparison to conventional electric guitars. To keep with a classical guitar "feel" on this wide neck electric guitar, the flat fingerboard radius was a must. However, many electric guitar players aren't accustomed to a flat radius, and they'd probably prefer something with a more conventional radius (e.g. 400mm, or 16") and it would have made any electric guitar player feel right at home with it. The radius of the fretboard does not significantly affect the string spacing, and so a flat radius, 400mm radius, or even a compound radius could have been put on this guitar. It is mostly a matter of taste.

This wide neck guitar was the perfect instrument for this customer. It had wide string spacing both at the nut and bridge, and it had a flat fingerboard radius. It felt essentially the same for him to play this guitar as it did his classical guitars... only now he could electrify his tone!

What could a wide neck guitar do for your playing?

How would you customize it to make it the perfect instrument for your needs?

Leave us a comment below, and thanks for reading!

Full Specs