We recognize that many musicians are often on tight budgets. In order to provide more affordable builds, we have found sources for less expensive OEM alternatives to many of the name brands. One limitation with these budget options is that they have fewer color selections. None of our budget bridges are available in nickel, satin chrome, or black nickel, but many still provide black and gold as options in addition to the standard chrome. Note that in most cases, black or gold hardware incurs an additional expense over chrome.
You do not have to specifically be making a “budget build” in order to choose these components. You are entirely welcome to mix name-brand and OEM components on your build.
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Pickups
| Pickup | 6-String | 7-String |
|---|---|---|
| Alnico Humbucker | ✓ | |
| Ceramic Humbucker | ✓ | ✓ |
| Alnico Single Coil | ✓ | |
| Alnico T-type | ✓ | |
| Ceramic P90 | ✓ |
| Pickup | 4-String | 5-String |
|---|---|---|
| Alnico J-type | ✓ | |
| Ceramic J-type | ✓ | ✓ |
| Alnico P-type | ✓ | ✓ |
| Ceramic Soapbar | ✓ | |
| Ceramic MM-type | ✓ | ✓ |
Bridges
| Bridge | 6-String | 7-String |
|---|---|---|
| S-style hardtail | ✓ | ✓ |
| T-type, T pickup | ✓ | |
| T-type, humbucker | ✓ | |
| TOM-style, N-type | ✓ | ✓ |
| Bridge | 4-String | 5-String |
|---|---|---|
| Vintage (stamped) | ✓ | |
| Traditional (medium-mass) | ✓ | ✓ |
| Modern | ✓ | ✓ |
Nuts
Our bleached bone and black micarta options are the two most economical nut materials we stock, providing options for matching your fretboard and/or finish. Tusq and Tusq XL are the most expensive nut materials we use with any regularity, but these are still not a particularly expensive item.
Tuners
We have not found OEM tuners that meet our quality standards at a discount significant enough to bother offering them. For guitar, we do have several different brand recommendations for lowest cost depending on headstock style and hardware color. For bass, we have not found anything more economical than our standard selections.