Heel

The part of the neck where it meets the body, shaped to take the joint and to support the joint against the pull of the strings.

Its shape decides how far up the neck a player's hand can reach, so a large, square heel blocks access to the highest frets while a sculpted or tapered heel opens them up. On a bolt-on instrument the heel also contains the pocket and the screws, and its thickness affects how rigidly the neck is held. A set neck has a longer gluing surface here, which is one reason those designs often claim more sustain.

Example: a guitar with a heavily contoured heel lets the hand reach the twenty-second fret comfortably, where a blocky one stops the reach around the fifteenth.

Heel

See also