Cars and guitars go together. Just ask Billy Gibbons.

After graduating college, Trev Wilkinson entered the automotive business, where he worked on all manner of cars, including luxury autos like Aston Martins and Ferraris, during the early ’80s. But it was on a Toyota that Wilkinson would stumble upon the idea that led to his guitar breakthrough.

“I was rebuilding a Toyota rear wheel bearing when I noticed the needle rollers and I thought, ‘if I could put that in a nut, it could allow the strings to go backwards and forwards — and that tinkering is what led to the Roller Nut,” Trev explained.

Even in the early days, Trev Wilkinson would explore beyond guitars. In the mid-1990s, he and neighbour Don Morris (who worked with Yamaha at the time) collaborated on Electroplex amps with the goal of achieving a high-headroom amp that could achieve lush overdrive at any volume and complement both single-coil pickups and humbuckers. Though Trev left the company in 1995 upon moving back to the UK, Electroplex has carried on and the boutique amps have earned impressive reviews in the likes of Premier Guitar.

Trev Wilkinson started Fret-King in the mid 1990s while still residing in the US, bringing five prototypes to NAMM in 1995 and secured orders from dealers. Unfortunately, initial sales didn’t live up to what Wilkinson hoped for, as dealers were reporting light interest from shoppers. Establishing Fret-King as a new brand would prove challenging, but there were some breakthroughs in those early days as well.

In the years to come, Trev Wilkinson would become a known name among guitarists for all manner of parts and components: from tuners to pickups and vibrato systems. Trev even worked with mechanics to develop the ADT Self-Tuning Bridge, a mechanical self-tuning device that debuted in his Fret-King Super-Matic guitar in 2010. Other manufacturers adopted Wilkinson parts for their guitars and many players upgraded their own guitars with Wilkinson hardware.