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#1
11-23-2020, 11:59 AM
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2-5/32 string spacing: martin WHY??
hello
i really don't understand why all the om recent martin models come out with terrible string spacing at the saddle: 54, 55, 56 mm!!! yes a great player can play with every spacing but i am not really used to play with such spacing, for me fingestyle is impossible. i can undertand that spacing for a dread, for a strumming guitar not for an orchestral model! i really don't understand martin choices. i love guitars like 0018v, om28v, om 42 (not the terrible reimagined), 00028ec, they fit my fingerstyle style. i can't play anything under 2-1/4 however i can play all above that. also many colling s or santa cruz - great guitars - have 2-3/16, really too narrow. love bourgeois string spacing instead 
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#3
11-23-2020, 02:05 PM
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No mystery. Martin (like all companies) is producing what customers want. You don’t stay in biz long otherwise. Narrower string spacing, wider nuts, slimmer necks...they may not be what you (or I) want but ultimately changing with the market is what allows Martin to produce (and sell) 100,000+ guitars a year and stay open. Which is a good thing.
__________________
Walker Clark Fork (Adi/Honduran Rosewood) Edmonds OM-28RS - Sunburst (Adi/Old Growth Honduran)
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#4
11-23-2020, 02:15 PM
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Quote:
As I recall, the oddball 2 5/32" was an attempt to tighten up the 2 3/16" string spacing a wee bit to address complaints about fingers slipping off of the top and bottom edge of the fretboard. Martin was not the only manufacturer to do this. The alternative was to add more wood to the neck and fretboard to increase the width of the fretboard. I guess the 2 5/32" solution was a more cost effective practical solution? Tommy
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#5
11-23-2020, 03:02 PM
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My most comfortable fingerpickers are my two pre-1940 Gibsons and my 2013 Fairbanks Smeck which have a string spread at the bridge of 2 3/8"
__________________
"You start off playing guitars to get girls & end up talking with middle-aged men about your fingernails" - Ed Gerhard
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#7
11-23-2020, 04:32 PM
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Martin sees Taylor guitars selling extremely well with their thin, skinny necks and decides that they must compete and do the same.
It's what Martin also did with their GP series. Looks a lot like Taylor, especially when this series first came out.
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#8
11-23-2020, 04:45 PM
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phisically impossible to play some fingerstyle chords position with something less than 57 mm at the saddle
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#9
11-23-2020, 05:04 PM
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I agree with you. I wish they were at least 2 3/16 and 2 1/4 would be even better. I have learned to get use to it but still...
The good news is that Martin does have some with 2 1/4 string spacing.
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#10
11-23-2020, 05:08 PM
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Fortunately, the OM-28 MD has 2 1/4". I agree, anything under that is for strummers only.
Steve
__________________
"Naturally torrified, & unnaturally horrified, since 1954"
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#11
11-23-2020, 05:35 PM
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#12
11-23-2020, 06:03 PM
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#13
11-23-2020, 07:44 PM
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Quote:
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#14
11-23-2020, 07:47 PM
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I find anything greater than 2 3/16" makes it much harder for me to cross pick. I really want a D28AA but I'm afraid I'll have issue with the 2 5/16" spacing.
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#15
11-23-2020, 09:50 PM
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Interesting. I play fingerstyle, primarily, but regularly transition from 2-5/32" and 2-1/4" without any noticeable issues. I'm much more temperamental about even string spacing at the nut than at the 12th fret, or near the saddle. A badly cut nut will consistently bug me, all the way up the fretboard.
... JT
__________________
"Yield to temptation. It may not pass your way again." - Robert A. Heinlein
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