Glad to hear you just needed to tighten the screws on the tuner knobs. My knobs came in and I was able to get my tuner problems all fixed also.

 

Marg, tightening the screws on the end of the tuner knobs increased the friction and fixed " the problem."

If you use a capo, it may not fit on an extra wide fretboard. A wide fretboard, and a long scale length, may mean some long stretches if you play chords. Some things to think about before having a custom fret board made. 

I saw you had posted ' Needs a tuner to be replaced' were you able to get this fixed? I don't have a McSpadden but also have tuner problems or their knobs. I have ordered replacement knobs and are waiting for them to come and hope that will take care of things. Ken, Rob and many members are very helpful, when we ask our questions someone is always able to give im-put. 

Enjoy your new adventures with the dulcimer

A 1.5" wide fingerboard set up with three equaldistant strings should be more than enough. You don't need four strings. When I got my fiddle I was shocked because the  4 strings are only 9/16" appart  at the nut and .75 at the octave. Where there is a will there is a way... Robert

The width of a fretboard is not a critical dimension for 99.99% of players, where VSL and body dimensions are of major importance to the sound of an instrument.

Most commercial (McSpadden, Folkcraft, Blue Lion) fretboards these days are 1.5" wide or 1.25" wide. That's pretty standard for most custom builder too, unless you ask.

If you have a custom dulcimer built by someone like Harpmaker Dave Lynch or any of the other custom builders here, you can specify how wide you want the fretboard. 

 The fretboards on my traditional dulcimers are considerably narrower than 1.25"; but then, I play Noter & Drone style and don't need huge spaces between strings.

updated by @ken-hulme: 06/25/15 09:31:33AM

 

I recently purchased a McSpadden M8 and was surprised at how narrow the fretboard was. I wear men’s 2XL gloves.

 

Except for Blue Lion, I found no dimensions listed for width of fingerboards. Most were centered around the VSL and body dimensions.

 

Can anyone suggest models/makes with more “roomy” fretboards?

 

 

 

updated by @larn-werner: 06/08/16 09:24:05PM