I would use a single tiny drop of Elmers or the like - all the glue has to do is keep it from falling out during string changes. Unless you're doing like, gorilla-style three whole-step bends on the 2nd fret, any extra glueyness beyond "hang on" is overkill. In fact, I haven't even glued any of mine for years now - I have this weird compulsion to play slide on everything possible, so most of my guitars have both a low nut and a high one. What it actually works out to is just a big ol' sack o' nuts in the drawer, I'm probably five ahead or something. I just leave the bottoms and sides of the nut relatively rough, like 180 or 220 grit or thereabouts.
While on the subject (or at least in the neighborhood nutbar) there's another really odd "fact" that gets passed on from one expert-type person to the next to the next etc, apparently there are a lot of people who make nuts without playing guitar? :icon_scratch: And that is,
each string should ride in a slot that is no deeper than half the diameter of the string!
You don't have to go into even one-
quarter Gorillanistics before you have strings popping out of their slots all over the place.
This guy below has most everything right, but he works on violins, cellos, mandolins and such where string bending (and whammy!) isn't such an issue.
http://www.lutherie.net/nuts.html
To me, it seems like this "one-half diameter" meme gets passed along because it is a useful way to keep strings from binding in a sloppily-cut slot, but I have to have slots that are deep enough to hold the strings when a certain amount of sideways pressure is applied - the slots just have to be carefully-shaped. But I have a lot of weird ideas, ask me about intonating a guitar with week-old strings because that's going to be a lot closer to what you usually play on, versus intonating with brand new strings so your guitar is out-of-tune 95% of the time. I can pop the top offa people's skulls with that one, because it's... it's... just...
wrong, that's all. That's not the way Saint Erlewine decreed it!
(But my guitar plays in tune!) :laughing3:
You should
always do
all of your adjustments with brand-new strings, so when you're playing it always sounds like... you need new strings. :icon_thumright: