For starters: double track guitars. Pan one take 100% to the left, the second one 100% to the right. Play both takes exactly the same. It will sound pretty big if you do it right.
It's all about good timing and precise playing. Too many guitar-players just play solos all their life and don't practise rhythm-guitar, which is 99% of the cake. 
Don't underestimate how important a good bass tone is - plenty of awesome guitar tones on albums sound wimpy by themselves. "And Justice For All" was mixed with basically none of Jason's playing audible, but someone remixed it a few years back with the bass at a proper level and it sounds huge.
Reverb tastefully applied can help.
layer multiple takes, not reamps.
the subtle imperfections will make it sound bigger.
use sounds that complement each other.
4-5 guitar tracks are not uncommon (2 left, 2 right, 1 in the middle <- often a 'odd' sounding midrange heavy sound mixed in low works nicely.
sometimes a otherwise undesirable tone will do the trick - turn down Character for the track in the middle to give it a speaker-sim type flair.
Yes, commit to one take at a time, Then do another one. And another.
Also, watch your gain. Oftentimes a tone that sounds absolutely bitchin' when you're rocking out will sound like a sloppy, indistinct mess in a full mix - try rolling your gain back a bit, just to the edge of where it doesn't sound good to play anymore. This is a great use for reamping as well, since you can track with more distortion so it sounds better while you're playing (similar to vocalists having some chorus and reverb on themselves in the headphones), but then go with a better in-the-mix tone afterward.
* Reduce your gain and compression.
* Record multiple takes separately, never re-amp to double up.
* Pan hard left and hard right.
* High pass your tracks to remove the low end sludge (let a real bass instrument that has low end definition add that, give space to all your instruments), don't be afraid to be brutal, same goes for some mid's cutting EQ.
* Use side chain compression to the kick drum to give it that extra "overloud" sound, typical of foo's etc.
Remember that the hugeness of a track really comes from the rhythm section, that's bass and drums, they must be absolutely tight, everything else can move around a little.
Oh and last but most definitely not least.
* Listen to your favorite records with that sound you want as you record and mix your own track. That way you can compare, contrast, hear what's different, get closer to the sound you're after.
And because i felt like taking a quick break I put together a meager example showing the difference the above should accomplish. I'm of course still learning myself about all this stuff but hopefully some of it can come in useful to other beginners.
http://www.peranders.com/general/noodle140725a.mp3
This example starts out with the usual mistakes every guitarist makes when they first try recording themselves. Overlaying too many guitars, too much gain, drowning out everything else, a wall of mids mush trying to get it louder and big enough, but it never works that way unfortunately. No matter how nice the original profiles you just end up losing all the detail.
The second half is about applying the above guidelines, bringing back the drums, adding bass, hi passing the guitars, it's the same profiles, but the gain has been reduced massively, lowering the levels across the board, hard panning etc, and i go out showing the individual tracks so you get an idea of what's involved in there.
It sounds counter intuitive, but you have to bring all the levels down and have the guitars take a back seat in order for them to sound bigger. Make the overall frequency balance more even and it begins to sound much larger (including adjusting the arrangement sometimes to leave the mid sounds when necessary).
Per, thanks for the demo, explains some of the ideas pretty well
Don't underestimate how important a good bass tone is - plenty of awesome guitar tones on albums sound wimpy by themselves. "And Justice For All" was mixed with basically none of Jason's playing audible, but someone remixed it a few years back with the bass at a proper level and it sounds huge.
This x10000
You can make pretty much any kind of guitar tone sound huge with good sounding drums and bass. Good example of a mix where the bass guitar does all the heavy lifting:
Skip to 2:20
I feel a slightly distorted bass, with a good sounding compressor and some surgical cuts in the guitar tracks around 300 and 700 Hz to give room for the bass, with the bass guitar track boosted around 700Hz works well.
Per, thanks for the demo, explains some of the ideas pretty well
Yeah, very cool! 
hopefully some of it can come in useful to other beginners.
Per, as an absolute beginner in studio stuff, I find every piece of your information very useful. Thank you.
Information / suggestion alone = very good.
Information / suggestion with sound demo = just perfect.
It's better to hear it once than to read about it a thousand times!
Please don't stop.
Good thread! but should guitar tracks be recorded mono or stereo? personal taste? what do the big producers do?
Good thread! but should guitar tracks be recorded mono or stereo? personal taste? what do the big producers do?
From what I have learnt until now, you always record raw guitar mono tracks. By recording/dubbing more mono tracks you create stereo effect by panning them L/R.
Am I right?
Good thread! but should guitar tracks be recorded mono or stereo? personal taste? what do the big producers do?
Normally always .mono, unless you want to commit to a stereo effect and record it from the beginning instead of doing the usual FX send/return later.
add Tape Saturation or something similar and the guitars will jump into your face
- High-passing at 80ish will usually work pretty well. Depending on your guitar tone, there might be some really "woofy" bits when you palm mute - a narrow cut somewhere around 200 will often sort this out. However, it depends entirely on your tone.
- Panning is really up to you... for metal, the most common setup is two tracks panned out to 100, two panned 60-80, and then your fifth track down the middle. Other people (myself included) just pan both pairs out to 100.
