Today I tried a Yamaha LS16 and a Seagull S6 Folk at Rose Morris in Denmark Street, London. Both wide neck, both smaller bodied, both £449.
I found the Yamaha noticeably livelier (someone said 'brighter') and I preferred it.
But it seemed quite similar to my Crafter DLX3000/SK, though less bass. So buying another guitar seemed unjustified.
The Yamaha LS16 is solid woods throughout. The Seagull is only solid top.
Similar nut widths but much wider saddle spacing on the Yamaha - be a challenge to strum I think.
Both nice to play.

Installing the Schatten HFN pickup

The Schatten HFN pickup sticks to the inside of the guitar directly under the bridge.
(Not between the saddle and the bridge like a more common piezo pickup).
Therefore it is invisible. Take a look at their website.

To install it you have to reach inside the guitar, so the strings must come off for that.

I had the original strap peg, so I also had to remove that and drill out the 12mm hole for the endpin socket. Very scary the first time!
I decided to practice on an old guitar. I bought a separate endpin jack socket, drilled my old Eko Ranger6 and installed the jack. Then I had a little more confidence to work on my new guitar.
Of course, you can pay a Luthier to do this for you, if you can find one that doesn't have a six-month queue...

Technique that worked for me:-

1. Take off the existing strap button
2. Apply masking-tape over the area to protect in case of drill slip and to reinforce the varnish.
3. Lay the guitar down on some protective material and bribe an assistant to hold it steady for you.
   
4. Drill out the screw hole with a small (5mm) HSS twist bit
5. Then I used a 4-12mm step drill bit. These say they are for sheet metal but I saw several recommendations for using them, so I did.
   
6. Make sure you allow the waste material to clear as you drill.
7. But the step bit doesn't drill the full hole depth (about 25mm).
8. So I used a 12mm HSS twist bit to finish the hole. This gives a tight friction fit for the jack, but since it will experience some load, from the strap and from inserting and removing the jack, I prefer the wood to be taking the strain rather than the washer against the external vanish.
9. It took me a couple of attempts to get the right amount of protrusion of the end-pin thread, and I needed someone with a smaller arm to reach in at all!
   

I had taken the option from Schatten of including a volume control wheel which is accessible from the soundhole, but not visually noticable.
To use external power you need a specific type of cable with a TRS (stereo) jack instead of the usual guitar mono jack. Schatten sells one, but you can get greater variety. I bought an XLR to TRS jack cable .

Crafter DLX3000SK + Schatten HFN pickup

Here's a sample of the result:


The strings are now Martin 80/20 Custom Lights. They sound not much different from the D'Addario strings that were on there when I bought it.

The pickup is plugged into, and powered from, an XLR on a small mixer, Soundcraft Folio Notepad.
Tone controls are flat.
The output of that has been feed into the line-in of my PC (ASRock motherboard with on-board sound).
Recording was made with Audacity software.

No battery!

Another attraction of the Schatten pre-amp; it can be line powered. So you do not have to have a battery inside the instrument.

Choosing an Acoustic Pickup

I have used a Schaller soundhole pickup on my Eko Ranger6 for MANY years.
I take it off when I do not need to use it. It was never a great match because the pickup was never wide enough for the string spacing.

Now I have a new Crafter DLX3000 . I chose it for its acoustic sound with a plan to sort the pickup later. I chose it because it also has wider than average string spacing.

If I had bought an electro-acoustic it would have come with an under-saddle piezo-electric pickup.
I had assumed that I would be adding one of these.

But having spent the money, the idea of drilling holes is a little daunting. So first I bought another soundhole pickup, Artec – MSP-50. It is pretty good and has adjustable pole pieces so that I get much more even pickup from each string. But it does impede the acoustic sound a little.

Looking harder at 'invisible' under-saddle pickups I started to see references to 'quack' and comments that such pickups can be quite harsh. Then I found Schatten.

The Schatten HFN installs inside the guitar, under the bridge.
I bit the bullet...
I'll let you know how it goes....

Want to try a wide neck?

I am very happy with my Crafter DLX3000/SK.
If you can get to Reading (UK) and want to try it, drop me a line.
In exchange for a contribution for my time etc, I'd be pleased to let you try it.

You can compare it with my old Eko Ranger 6, and try a yamaha FG-312 12 string, and bring your own guitar for reference.

I'm now selecting the right pickup to install.

My list of guitars

Bottom line:
I bought a Crafter DLX3000/SK from Modern Music in Truro

I did try a Tanglewood TSM at Mr Music - beautiful but out of my budget (£1200)

Other wide necks that I would have liked to try include:

• Tanglewood TW15WN / TW15NSWN try Mr Music
• Hopf D 6-0 47 TA
• Timberline T70D
• Seagull Artist

Now I will add the Tanglewood TW73WN (the 'WN' is key). A Parlour, not a Dreadnought, but I would like to compare.