Help spotting neck pocket problems

[DR5Guy]

Few people of this board said that certain models/batches have neck pocket problems. How to spot these when buying used guitars? What exactly to look for?

Thanks

[DonP]

I think the single hum DK2M with reverse headstock was them, but I'm not 100% certain.

[atdguitars]

This holds true for any bolt on neck guitar.

• Make sure the strings line up evenly on both the low and high sides of the neck
• Make sure the neck doesn't sit higher in the front of the pocket than the rear. Look or measure to make sure the bottom of the fretboard is parallel with the body. It's ok to have a bit of a down angle from the back to front due to neck shims and different manufacturers string geometry.
• Eyeball the heel of the fretboard to see if its parallel with the leading edge of the bridge. If its not look to see if the neck is slanted to one side or the other in the pocket or the bridge itself is off.
• Look for shims in the sides of the neck pocket.That can be a tell tale sign of a poorly cut neck pocket or an ill fitting neck.
• See if the neck moves in the pocket itself by holding the body and gently pushing down or pulling up on the neck from side to side. If it moves it could be from loose neck screws or a poorly cut pocket.

I think that covers the basics.

[Axewielder]

Gaps between the neck and body are no good. However, if the fit is too tight, it can cause neck pocket cracks (mostly a cosmetic issue, but kind of an ugh factor here)