Proto Guitars, pickups, pedals and parts are designed and built using the knowledge, skill and experience that we have acquired during our combined four decades of playing, fixing, tweaking, buying, selling and perfecting every aspect of the electric guitar. Our pickups are custom-built from the bobbins up and are hand-wound on our (massive) vintage Bobbineer pickup winding machine (just like Leo
used!). We carry a large selection of AlNiCo (2, 3, 4, 5, 8) magnets, as well as an assortment of modern and vintage wire gauges and materials. We spend a lot of time and effort matching up proper value pots and caps (where applicable) to each individual pickup and player's needs. Treble bleeds, phase switches and coil splits are all available as upgrades on our custom pickups. Our electric guitars (coming soon!) are built to serve one purpose: to be the best sounding and playing instrument possible. No flamey finishes, no bursts or glistening gold hardware - just smart design, solid quality, smart planning, perfect setup, fully customizable electronics and hardware. We finish the guitars as simply as possible in efforts to cut down the costs so that we can concentrate on the quality and build of the actual instrument. We hope that by cutting down on this costly and time-consuming element of guitar building that we can sell a masterfully built instrument at a very reasonable and approachable price that any musician can easily afford. And stay tuned for the first Proto pedal - a two channel germanium hybrid fuzz designed with fuzz guru Joe Gagan!
