What are your favorite neck profiles?

[jeremy]

for contrast, i just measured my favorite neck and its 25mm at the nut and 26mm at the heal

 

[Rex_Rocker]

for contrast, i just measured my favorite neck and its 25mm at the nut and 26mm at the heal

Is that neck like super stable and not very sensitive to temperature changes?

That's the one thing I love about my Gibson's 50's neck. It's rock solid. That being said, it is quarter sawn Maple too, so I guess that helps.

But my LTD is also pretty stable. I guess it's because it's 3-piece. It's just my Fender that's kinda finicky even if it's baked Maple.

 

[ehdwuld]

I have only owned wizard II necks

I tried the wizard III in-store
And it was a bit wider
From 42mm to 43mm wide at the nut

The ones in the store
Had binding that was sharp and sticking out on the edges of the fretboard

Weird that all the IIIs were like this not the twos or anything

Kinda put me off them
May have been a bad run

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I have only owned wizard II necks

I tried the wizard III in-store
And it was a bit wider
From 42mm to 43mm wide at the nut

The ones in the store
Had binding that was sharp and sticking out on the edges of the fretboard

Weird that all the IIIs were like this not the twos or anything

Kinda put me off them
May have been a bad run

Pretty sure the standard Wizard II was 43 mm at the nut?

https://ibanez.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_neck_types

 

[Phantasmagoria]

I had an S470 that had one of those Wizard II necks that I don't like.



.

To each their own. Just looking at that thing makes me itch to pick it up and shred it to oblivion :laugh2:
​

 

[Rex_Rocker]

To each their own. Just looking at that thing makes me itch to pick it up and shred it to oblivion :laugh2:
​

Yeah, it wasn't bad. But the thing is it kinda covered very similar groudn to this:



Except the neck wasn't as comfy and the trem wasn't as good. And I'm not really a trem guy, so one had to go, and it wasn't a hard choice.

 

[ErikH]

Warmoth Boatneck
Warmoth Wolfgang (crazy comfortable)
Gibson 50's
Whatever is on the SG Classic I had. It's not 50's, it's not 60's, somewhere in between.
The profile on my Martin D-28.
SRV
Eric Johnson (V to C)

 

[jeremy]

Is that neck like super stable and not very sensitive to temperature changes?

That's the one thing I love about my Gibson's 50's neck. It's rock solid. That being said, it is quarter sawn Maple too, so I guess that helps.

But my LTD is also pretty stable. I guess it's because it's 3-piece. It's just my Fender that's kinda finicky even if it's baked Maple.

it is super stable and i live in the north east where almost everything needs a tweak here and there. it has a truss rod, but ive never used it. i have a few around the same size and they all are very stable. this one is a korina tele neck with rw board

 

[eclecticsynergy]

For decades I could play anything happily, though I have big hands and my preference always was for something not too thin.
In recent years I get cramps when playing a very thin neck for more than 20 or 30 minutes.
Hardly ever play my Hagstrom anymore with its thin/fast neck, and I gave away an Ibanez superStrat to my son years ago.
Perfectly happy with medium necks though, even the Gibson '60s profile which is thin but not too skinny for me.

My personal favorites are PRS Pattern Vintage, Pattern Regular, and Wide-Fat (which isn't actually fat, just a hair deeper).
Also very much like the neck on my DGT - never figured out if it's a little thicker or just feels that way because of the jumbo frets.

Love the medium-chunky profile on my Guitar Trader pre-Historic after all these years - but each of those was a little different.
Gibson's 59 profile is good for me; the korina neck on my old Moderne feels fantastic in my hand.
One of my LPs has the 58 'baseball bat' profile; that's fat and fabulous. Very much like my '49 Gibson acoustic.

 

[fretburner]

In this order:

1. Kramer Nightswan (original 80s)
2. Gibson 60s Slim Taper
3. Ibanez JS1000
4. EBMM Musicman Luke 2

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I'm a small guy myself. But I always wondered how much that really affects my taste in neck profiles.

My second guitar was an Epiphone Les Paul Speciall II which had a profile close to the Gibson Rounded 50's. Chunky, but not '58 kinda massive. I always thought that was kinda like the definitive neck profile. I mean, I always wanted a Les Paul since I first started guitar, and that was my first Les Paul. My first guitar was a Yamaha Pacifica which had a thinner neck, IIRC.

But then I started getting nicer guitars, and the nicer the guitar got, the thinner the neck profile. The nicest guitar I've ever owned was an Ibanez RGA121 (which, I mean, is nice, but it's certainly not top-of-the-line Custom Shop stuff) which had the Wizard Prestige neck. Really thin. I then got an RG570 which had an even thinner neck, but I always preferred the RGA121's neck probably because I preferred the guitar overall.

A few years after that, I got my first Gibson Les Paul. Like I said, I've always wanted a Les Paul. The guitar itself is great. It's the best-sounding guitar I've owned. But the neck is... tolerable. I mean, I can get around on it. I like that the fretboard at least is not round like a Fender. But man, I really wished it had the 60's neck. And the thing is it's not even uncomfortable. At some point, I thought it was even pretty nice, but I was comparing it to my Epi 1959 which had a slightly chunkier neck with the clunky D-shape Epiphone are known for. But now that I play it alongside my Fender with the Flat Oval or my LTD with the Thin U... It's just not the neck I'd want on my Les Paul.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

I think a chunky neck is probably better if you play with your thumb over the top edge of the fret board (and have reasonably large hands). But If you're like me and play with it centred behind the neck ( ie "classical style" ironically :laugh2 I can't see how a fat neck feels comfier than a skinny one even w/ large hands... though eh who knows..

It (fat/thin necks) does'nt make as much of a difference to me as it used to though...

 

[Ascension]

My all-time favorite neck profile is the 93 to 94 Carvin neck through profile. It's unique and was the first 2 years of the 25 scale, it changed in 95 when they introduced the carbon rods. Slightly thinner than the current thin neck through profile, with more of a D profile. The current Kiesel 25 scale neck through thin profile would be a close second. My solid KOA 93 DC 127 has that profile and is my favorite guitar to just pick up and play. It is now in need of a re-fret and I plan to fret it with Stainless.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

Steve Vai and Paul Gilbert with their humongous spidery hands playing paper thin necks come to mind.

 

[weepingminotaur]

I'm a "thumb on back of neck" guy with relatively long fingers but I still prefer thinner necks.

 

[IMENATOR]

Fender Stratocaster Standard MIM, the one before the Player Series.

 

[orpheo]

My favorite neck shape is an asymmetrical shape, like the Wolfgang but more extreme, and then either 22mm thick from nut to heel, 24mm from nut to heel, or 25.5 mm from nut to heel. I don't like thinner than 22mm.

 

[ErikH]

Steve Vai and Paul Gilbert with their humongous spidery hands playing paper thin necks come to mind.

Steve yes, but Paul's sig models, especially the Fireman, have a much fatter neck profile. Some of his early RG signature models had thin necks but gradually got fatter.

Speaking of sig models, the Jackson PC1 neck profile is really nice. It's fatter than a typical Jackson. About the only Jackson I was comfortable playing. A buddy of mine had one of the early models and let me play it at gigs a few times as my main guitar. It was sweet.

 

[Masta' C]

I think the idea that "I have small hands, so I must need a small/slim neck" or "I have big hands, so I must need a big/thick neck" gets overblown and leads a lot of players in the wrong direction... ::cough::tonewood::cough::

Funny how many examples there are of guys with big, meaty palms or long, lanky fingers preferring "thin" necks, myself included

 

[Chistopher]

My hands are big enough that I can pump fake a basketball with one hand and I prefer a smaller neck. The thickness doesn't matter to me as much as the width though. I like a wider neck most of the time.