TUSQ by Graph TechGuitar Nut Slotted Strat Style PQ-5000-00

I put this into my MIM Roadworn Strat myself and it was easy to do and improved the stability (as I use the trem arm on my strat and needed something better than the plastic nut it came with). The slots were at the right height and spacing. The sides stuck out a bit from the sides of the fretboard and needed to be filed down (taping the side of the neck and using a nail file). Great product. Easy mod.

On my Player Mustang, this was a good fit and required very little to make it work. The little tab at the bottom is there in the event that your guitar has a flat bottom for the nut. On my Mustang it was arched, so I just needed to file the tab off with a tiny little file. The width and thickness needed to be adjusted slightly to fit properly. I used a piece of medium grit sandpaper flat on the granite countertop and moved the part on top of it to keep it exactly flat to trim the thickness slightly. The guitar is tuning a lot more precisely and smoothly now. Being in tune is super important in the end. You will sound better tuned precisely with a guitar that is intonated properly. It was worth the money to me and there is no real need to pay someone to do this for you if you are reasonably handy. Take care with removing the stock part. You’ll want to score the edges with an exacto knife to remove it cleanly. On my guitar there was some finish on the nut that kind of glued it in place. Once I scored the edge it came out with just a very light tap.

I bought this guitar nut for a MIM Stratocaster HSS tremolo bridge guitar. I have experience with these TUSQ XL nuts and they are as good as they claim. I think they are better than bone nuts, but aside from that, they fit perfectly in the 9.5 radius Strat neck with minimal adjustments. They are a little long and they do need to be trimmed down in length for the 42mm MIM Strat neck slot. The locking tab may have to be filed off as well. The string slots are done really well, and again, depending on your nut slot, they might need a little height adjustment to get open string playability and lower fret intonation right. I took a chance and bought this nut in “used”condition. It came in the original packaging which had been opened but the nut was in perfect new condition. I saved a couple bucks and got a good quality new Graph Tech nut for the Strat. Thank you Amazon! I have been playing, maintaining, and rebuilding guitars for over 50 years. I’ve been around the block a few times when it comes to guitars and guitar components. Graph Tech is a Canadian company that produces good quality components. I have no problem recommending them.

This was great. Firstly, I got what I ordered. It was packaged, not loose from a bulk shipment. I opted for the regular Tusq not the XL (which does NOT stand for extra large, just sayin') Secondly, I'm not a pro. Or even close. I did this in about an hour in my kitchen! These Tusq nuts come with that tab on the bottom because sometimes the slot in the neck is flat. Only the top of the nut has the arc. If that's the case you leave the tab on and the nut is supported across the flat bottom. I had my old one so I knew I needed to sand off the tab. Sanding this nut was easy. Oh, and don't be fooled by the difference in length. My old one broke off at the sixth string slot so, yeah, its shorter than the replacement. I then sanded the back side a little to make it a tad thinner. I wanted it to fit snug but it was just a little too wide right out of the package. (I just laid the sand paper on the table and rubbed the nut around on it.) Then to lower it a little I laid the sandpaper on the neck of the guitar and went back and forth with the nut to match the arc of the neck. (I think its a 9.5" radius which is pretty much standard these days) The old one looked like it was tapered a little. Thinner on the high end, so I just over did the sanding ever so slightly on that half. I didn't sand it for length. It is a hair wider than the neck. I made the high "E" side flush with the guitar and it was fine for me. I also did not use any glue. The fit was nice and tight. It doesn't fall out when unstrung. I also thought it would be easier to shim if I discovered I had over sanded somewhere. I strung the guitar, played it for a while and am very pleased with the result. Again this was not an "upgrade" this was a necessary replacement of a broken piece. Any difference in sound could be from the new strings, I don't know, but I have no issues with the nut or the process of installing it. A little common sense- make sure you put the wide slots on the low end and the narrow ones on the high!- and being just a bit handy and this is really simple. Had the arc of the new one not matched the old (7.25 vs 9.5) then I would have returned it. I had a hard time finding out what my particular guitar's neck radius might be. Finally I just went for it and it turned out fine.

I originally purchased this for a Squier Strat (SSS) made in Indonesia. As this was the curved nut, it did not fit my Squier as I needed the flat nut (which I ended up purchasing separately (great service from Amazon on this one). To remove the old nut, I cut into the edges of the old nut using a razor blade (X-Acto knife) to loosen it and then used a small block of wood that I tapped on either side of the nut to loosen it more. Once the old nut started loosening, it was cake to remove. I then cleaned the space of old glue (mine was gummy) before pre-fitting the new nut. The new (flat) nut was a perfect fit and lined up perfectly with the old nut I removed (when I put them side to side, holding them up). I glued it using a small amount of wood glue that I brushed in. Just to make sure it cured well, I left the guitar alone for a couple days before I strung it up again (I was also busy). So, was it worth the effort to change the nut? Absolutely! First of all, it's really easy. Second of all, I no longer have strings binding and twanging loudly as I'm tuning. Tuning is much smoother and it has increased the sustain somewhat. As for the extent of the sound change/sustain, I'm not sure how much was due to the nut and how much was due to the new GraphTech saddles or GFS Steel block I installed. But, after doing these things, I can say the sound and sustain was dramatically better. I can attribute better tuning and smoother bending to this nut though.

I've used Graph Tech nust before on my Epi's (a 339 and a Les Paul Special) with excellent results and easy installation. This one I installed on a Squier Bullet Strat SSS. The Squier come with a flat bottom nut that was a bit taller and thicker that the Graph Tech replacement, so I ended up filling the nut groove in the neck with a shim and then laminating the new nut with white plastic sheeting to make it thicker. Since I needed to remove all the strings to do this, I replaced the stock strings with some nickle wounds. The result was a much, much brighter tone (I suspect the strings played a part in this as well as the nut). The tuning was much easier to accomplish with no nut binding. If you own any guitar with a factory plastic nut, this is a must do upgrade.

Seems the spacing is a little off on the top fret might just be 1 in a million. Like the sound, ordering another and will see read if you care about the spacing: Update: I had written to the company about how the spacing was off compared to my standard fender nut... well they reimbursed graciously and I'm writing this because I'd like to inform everyone about where to find the technical info about the companies products so you can make an informed purchase... The exact specs for spacing of and height and tone are on their website... I didn't look because I guess I was stupid and have been doing much more research before purchasing anything. The spacing on these (PT500000) part at the bottom strings slightly where as the PQL-5010-00 space out towards the top of the nut. Even the 42mm nut for fender has slightly different spacing than the regular nuts though I've LOVED the PQL-5010-00 because the size and shape of my fingers gives me a low spot right below my knuckle on my pointer finger (with normal nuts) which makes me have to press extra hard when doing bridge chords. These fix that issue for me (amazing how a few .00 of an inch can do that) and I've been using the PQL5010-00 and cutting them to size because I rarely slide off on the top string though often do with the (high E / bottom string (probably gravity...)). The sound difference is noticeable between the raised PT500000 and the flat PQL5010-00 so everything the website says is true from what I can tell. I've purchased another one in faith of the company to replace on my neck for my Stratocaster and I've purchased the barrels for a tele and saving for the Strat bridge... The only thing that is annoying for me is the time it takes to sand down the height of these nuts LOL. They are much stronger and durable than bone nut or plastic so I recommend using 220 grit sand paper (wet sanding..., also clean off the paper with water once you get a build up of Teflon) when getting it close to the height you want and maybe a good file for the beginning shaving because it takes a while to file down if you like low action. Or take it to a Guitar Luthier and they can work it out for ya. It's easy to go past the mark and waste $15-17 so once you get close go slow. Either that or you have to add paper which kinda defeats the purpose of physics point contact vibration.

Made a huge difference. Holds tune better. Sounds better. Feels and plays better. It was very easy to cut and file! Massive value for such awesome quality! SAVED MY SQUIRE STANDARD STRAT FROM THE SLEDGEHAMMER!

Exactly what my partscaster needed. Nearly perfect fit on flat bottom, got lucky and didn't need to sand down much to match height. You don't need to prep the string contact point, they are good to go if you're using 9's or 10's on your strat. Good sound and smooth tuning - considering also for my MIM Tele. A good buy, also note it's made in Canada.

What I didn't know is that you CAN get this tusk XL nut in the ivory colour! But I kinda like the black now it's in... It didn't affect my tone that I could hear, the last one was just plain tusk, not the XL. Where I used pencil graphite to keep the strings moving. Of course with XL it's intrinsically self lubricating via what it's made of. This particular nut is pretty cool because you may not know if you have a flat or round bottom without removing the old nut. Well I work out, so I have a flat bottom. Where you just leave the tab on. If you have a round bottom, you can easily file the tab off. One thing! If you have a flat bottom, then with this nut, not all of your bottom will touch the timber. This when Graphtech say that their nuts have better tone because there's no cavities in them, like with bone etc. Well, with this nut you have two big cavities either side of the tab? Okay so, on my Strat this is the third nut, the first, the original nut was plastic and it was hollow!! It was okay... The next was one of these but just tusk not XL. It improved the tone!! The current one is the XL the tone didn't seem to change? Context: I also have the Graphtech metal body saddles with PTFE inserts. Now those DID improve the tone to a surprising degree! They put a smile on my face. And they are GREAT! Hardly any string breakages, more stable tuning. I think that the nuts don't notice as much because when fretting you aren't playing through the nut. You're playing from fret to saddle? And .. Concider Floyd Rose Guitars! They have a metal nut, and they still have great tone. So, will I buy the flat bottom version ? No... I'm happy with this one. I think that the flat bottom would only amount to a teeny improvement when playing open strings. I think that Graphtech are a great company! They don't make false claims, and they really believe in their products, I saw one of the founders on line. It's refreshing! So... That's it my review... Where I'll just say it one more time 'bottom' 😅

Fini la corde qui accroche au sillet et les désaccordages intempestifs ! Avec ce sillet on retrouve une stabilité d’accordage parfaite et on peut enfin utiliser le vibrato de sa Stratocaster sans craindre le désaccordage (surtout avec des mecas a blocage)

Les sillets graphtech sont excellents, je note ici le fait que j'ai commandé un sillet type stratoide (comme précisé dans la boutique), et j'ai reçu un sillet type gibson (modèle pour epiphone)... Ce Modèle n'est évidemment pas du tout compatible avec un manche de type Fender. Il m'est donc absolument inutile.

Na veel schuurwerk aan de zijkanten blijkt dat de topkam te laag is voor mijn Squier strat.