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What spacing do you guys use from E string to the edge of the fretboard? I know it’s largely preference and I’ve seen ~2-4mm (.080” to .125”).
One guitar neck I have is just under 1-11/16. I want to replace the nut and I’m wondering how close I can comfortably get to the edge of the board without any risk.
A lot of the pre-notched bone nuts I get are 43mm wide, whilst the necks they get fitted to are often 42mm wide, so they just get filed down at the ends and I use the same string spacing without any issues. I haven't actually measured any distances. As long as the strings aren't too near the edge, I don't worry. There have been a couple of guitars where the 43mm nut string spacing looked too wide, so I did look for a 42mm nut with smaller string spacing in those instances.
These days, I can get backs of bone nuts off Amazon in different widths very cheaply, so I just keep a stock in. I'm always swapping nuts out, either from kits or friends' guitars with plastic nuts (or where I file the nut slots too low when setting up and have to start again).