NGD - Like I needed another Strat, right?

[Harley Hexxe]

Hey Gang,

    Here I am again, bracing for the upcoming winter storm, and I already bought all the essentials, (Beer, Bacon, and Guitars).

    Speaking of guitars, that's right, I bought another one, but definitely not new, or new to me. May I introduce my latest acquisition,
    a 1983 Elite Stratocaster with the FTLN included, and the original whammy bar. (Usually, those two items are missing and cannot be replaced).
     I know it's a 40-year old guitar, not made anymore, and really doesn't look like anything impressive, and that's what everyone thinks. The truth is, this is the final innovative offering from Fender while under CBS ownership, and it's really a Hot Rod disguised as a family car. It's meant to look like funny version of a Strat, but it hides several secrets.
    The low impedance pickups in this beast are pretty quiet but there is also another pickup coil hidden under the pick guard that comes into play with whatever pickup you've already selected.
    As you can see in the picture, you can choose any combination of pickups you want with the three buttons (push-on, push-off). You have three knobs like any Stratocaster would have, but only one is what you expect, that's the volume. Under that is the TBX control. This is the first guitar to offer that tone circuit, which later became Eric Clapton's favorite addition to his signature model guitar. This is sort of the only actual tone control on the guitar. There is a center detent on this stacked pot which leaves the guitar sounding like a stock Strat, but rolling it CW gives an increase in Presence frequencies so you can get more Strat than Strat type of tones. This is kind of interesting with a few different pickup combinations, but not so much with just the bridge pickup IMHO. Rolling the knob back from the center position works like a normal tone knob.
    Under the TBX control is the MDX knob. With this pot rolled all the way off, you have all your standard Strat tones with whatever pickups you have selected, and this includes the combinations you can't get with a stock Strat 5-way switch. When you roll this pot on, it brings in the above mentioned hidden coil by way of a preamp, also hidden under the pick guard. This essentially turns this guitar from a stock Strat, into a Superstrat. There are a lot of tonal possibilities with this guitar.
   Also the bridge is the only one Fender ever designed to sit flush against the body of the guitar as opposed to the floating bridges which preceded and succeeded it. It's a top loading bridge because there is no access to it from the back of the guitar. The springs and claw are also under the pick guard underneath the pickups.
   There is also the Fine Tuning Lock Nut, (FTLN), located on the headstock, which works, but is a completely different beast than any other locking string system out there. Most guitar players didn't like it and couldn't get used to it, so they took them off and either lost them or threw them out. That's why you'll see many of these guitar with three holes in the headstock if you go looking for them.
    The guitar is overall very comfortable to play, light, with a fast neck. The neck profile is very much like the Modern "C" neck but slimmer. It's a little wider than the vintage necks with a 12" radius fret board, so you can lower your action as far as you want it. Pretty sweet!

    So,...the question comes up: Why did I want another Stratocaster, especially one that is 40 years old?
    Answer: I used to have two of these guitars back in the day and sold them in 1989. These are the only guitars I've had any sellers remorse over. There was no other Stratocaster like this before or after it came into being. They were only made for two years, then when CBS sold the company to the current owners, they opted to drop guitars like this, and decided to focus on doing the vintage reissues and the stingy modern Strats that we still see today. (Nothing more than slight variations of the original model made in 1954).

    Besides, I seem to have a penchant for the Stratocasters that do more than just the off the rack guitars that you still see today, even with all their "updated and modded" features. My collection speaks for itself.
   *1980 Fender "STRAT" - the first factory hot-rodded Stratocaster
   *2007 Fender VG Stratocaster - The schizophrenic Stratocaster with multiple personalities
   *2016 Fender CG-1 Roland Ready Stratocaster - set up with all you need for a Roland GR-55 Synth module

So this guitar fits right in with that category. More importantly, I LIKE it! It's been making me want to play more.

There it is.

[rnolan]

Hey Harley, nice  , anything that makes you want to play more is a good purchase IMHO, this one though is somewhat special (and rare).  One question, do you access the truss rod through the middle of the FTLN ?  I've never seen that setup before, interesting way to do it.  I do remember fender coming up with a lock nut that locked all the strings with a leaver on one side of the nut.

[Dante]

Well, THAT is something I've never seen before! I gotta see a pic of the springs & claw under the pickguard...that's odd

Very cool guitar, Harley, I'd wanna play it alot too. Love the little buttons to turn the PUs on/off, a very 80s feature

[Systematic Chaos]

That's indeed an interesting one - congrats!
I never really bonded with Strats, mainly cuz of the guitar body size (I'm 5ft7 and everything but Dinky, RG or 7/8 size guitars look silly *duh*) and the way the controls layout, always in the way of my right hand...
That being said, 2 guitars I still have sellers remorse about are a first series Fender Sambora Floyd Rose Signature Strat in Cherry Sunburst (one of the first batch that was made in the Custom Shop back then) and a 1989/1990 Deluxe Strat Plus in Crimson Frost (the one with the Sperzel locking tuners, Wilkinson nut, Lace Sensors (Red, Silver, Blue) and the Blanda Bridge)...that thing was a tone monster

[Harley Hexxe]

Hey Harley, nice  , anything that makes you want to play more is a good purchase IMHO, this one though is somewhat special (and rare).  One question, do you access the truss rod through the middle of the FTLN ?  I've never seen that setup before, interesting way to do it.  I do remember fender coming up with a lock nut that locked all the strings with a leaver on one side of the nut.

Hey Richard,
   Yes sir! This guitar is a rare bird indeed. At the time it was the most modern rendition of what a Stratocaster could be.
   To access the truss rod, you have to unscrew the FTLN and remove it, which is something I'm going to do to this guitar. I will keep the parts in a plastic bag until I can get it to Dan Erlewine to reposition it correctly on the headstock. Unfortunately, this one was mounted in a hurry, and it's clocked slightly off center, which causes strings to break prematurely. CBS was always pushing for maximum production quotas on every line of guitars.

   I remember the lock nut you're talking about, that is on one of the many models made by Fender Japan during the 80's. They did a lot of crazy guitar designs under the Fender name back then. If you want to see something really odd, then google 1985 Fender Performer. That's going to make you scratch your head and wonder WTF were they thinking?!?

[Harley Hexxe]

Well, THAT is something I've never seen before! I gotta see a pic of the springs & claw under the pickguard...that's odd

Very cool guitar, Harley, I'd wanna play it alot too. Love the little buttons to turn the PUs on/off, a very 80s feature

Hey Dante,

    I'll get some more pics up as soon as I order more strings. There are a couple of sites I'm looking at:
     *Strings By Mail
     * Just Strings

There is a way to set up this guitar so the bridge will float a little, which I'd like to try out. Then again, maybe not. I do want to re-string it with .010s. It has .009s on it now.

    I'm sure you'll find this tremolo setup very interesting, as with the rest of the hidden goodies under the pick guard.

    By the way, I found this guitar on Reverb, in a repair shop in Escondido. It was on my watch list for over a year, then I decided WTF, why not? Some really nice folks at James Hood Guitar Repair.

[Harley Hexxe]

That's indeed an interesting one - congrats!
I never really bonded with Strats, mainly cuz of the guitar body size (I'm 5ft7 and everything but Dinky, RG or 3/4 size guitars look silly *duh*) and the way the controls layout, always in the way of my right hand...
That being said, 2 guitars I still have sellers remorse about are a first series Fender Sambora Floyd Rose Signature Strat in Cherry Sunburst (one of the first batch that was made in the Custom Shop back then) and a 1989/1990 Deluxe Strat Plus in Crimson Frost (the one with the Sperzel locking tuners, Wilkinson nut, Lace Sensors (Red, Silver, Blue) and the Blanda Bridge)...that thing was a tone monster

Hey Magnus,

     I know those two models well. I believe the Sambora model was the first one that Fender was actually licensed to use a Floyd Rose on. The Deluxe was a pretty hot sounding guitar. That Wilkenson nut was replaced with the LSR nut after a year or two because there were some kind of issues with tuning stability due to wear on the single roller bar. I like the LSR much better, and I have it mounted on a few of my guitars. It does affect the tone of any guitar it's mounted on, and the effect is the same as having a "Zero" fret on your guitar. They kept that bridge design for a long time, but I never heard it called that. My 2007 Strat mentioned above has that on it.
     I think if you had this guitar in your hands, you'd probably like it. The body is smaller than the ones Fender was making after CBS sold the company, so it's very comfortable. I do remember thinking how the post CBS guitars seemed to have larger bodies, which is why I never got into them. It's amazing how such a small detail can change the feel of a guitar.

[rnolan]

Hey Harley, wow, that (1985 Fender Performer) is a strange beast.

[Dante]

Hey Harley, wow, that (1985 Fender Performer) is a strange beast.

It is! But, it's pretty dang cool looking and the volume knob is farther away from the bridge PU, so WIN WIN. Here's a pic of one for sale online

Question: is that little micro switch on the pickguard a stock item? and...what's with those pickups?

[Harley Hexxe]

@Richard,

     Told ya so! 

@Dante,

     Yes, it is a stock item, it's a coil splitter. I played one years ago at the same store where I bought my original Elite Strats, and I really didn't like it too much.

     First, it doesn't sound like a Fender or a Gibson. It doesn't have enough crispness at the high end, and it doesn't have enough mellow on the low end.
     It might be okay for some clean 80's-ish tones, but I don't feel like it has enough guts to give you a good lead tone.

    The second thing I didn't like about it, is the neck profile. The width is like the vintage necks so it's more narrow feeling, and the back has these pronounced shoulders at the top and bottom, which makes it feel kind of obstructive. Just weird.

     The pickups are what they came with, and I think they are humbuckers, which explains the coil tap switch. If they aren't humbuckers, then the switch is a bright cap that you can cut in or out. There's no preamp in the guitar so those pickups are not active like the Elite pickups are. That guitar doesn't take a battery.

    Yeah, it looks cool, but didn't sound as cool unfortunately.

[Dante]

I can see that - the sound not being 'Strat' with 2 humbuckers

Whenever folks put two humbuckers in a Strat or Tele, I wonder what they're thinking....takes away all that twang and bell like chime. Given the era, I can see why Fender did try it

[Harley Hexxe]

Fender USA didn't do that, Fender JAPAN LTD. did.

In the 80's while Fender was transitioning from CBS to FMIC, Fender Japan was given the leeway to come up with and implement their own ideas. These guitars were referred to as the Fender Contemporary Series. You might remember those. Many of those guitars were black with white decals and lettering. The ones with locking trems usually had the one you see pictured on the Performer.

   For about a year, in late 1984 to late 1985, there were no Fender guitars made in the USA, while Fender was setting up new home offices in Scottsdale Az. And they were setting up a small temporary shop in Corona California, which later became the Custom Shop after Fender acquired a larger facility in Arizona. At the same time, they were also contracting with Mexico to begin production there too, but that didn't happen for a few more years.

   The thing that made me leery of the Fender Contemporary series was that you couldn't tell what kind of wood was being used for those guitars. Even the necks were painted black, so for all I knew, they could have been made out of laminated plywood. It's also kind of interesting to note that the original idea for the vintage reissue guitars came from Fender Japan. They made the first one and sent it to the guys in California. It's a pretty popular story. They folks at Fender USA looked at it and almost cried. The attention to detail was so good on it. That's when they pitched the Vintage Reissue series and the Elite series to CBS in 1982. So, that's how we got them to be made here in the USA, and that's how Fender Japan carried Fender USA during their transition period.

  Sheesh, now I feel like the Cliff Claben of the Depot

[Dante]

STORY TIME:

In 1984 & 85, I was in the Air Force and I flew to Japan often. I loved it there

Anyways, I was always buying a couple Boss pedals at a time for $10 each (the exchange rate was good then) and I once bought an Ibanez Roadstar II for $150 (with a hardcase). It had an HSS config with some really great sounding single coils. That was my Strat for about 15 years. No idea what the body was, but it was black with white binding and the neck was bare wood with a skunk stripe and Rosewood fingerboard. It had the crappy Pro Rockr bridge that I always hated.

I could have bought so many more Japanese guitars but they were not in vogue at the time and I had my Explorer at home ;)

[Harley Hexxe]

Okay Dante,

   You asked for it, you got it Toyota.

    Here's what the Elite looks like under the hood, and you can see why this wasn't too popular with most guitar players. There's a little bit of work involved with setting up the Elite the way you want it.

    I took it apart again because I broke my 3rd E string since I got it. This is because the FTLN as I mentioned early on, was not clocked correctly, so I removed it for now. I will take that completely apart and clean and polish it, lubricate the threads and put it back together, then I'll have it remounted and clocked so that the strings are centered on the tabs that control the fine tuning.

As you can see in the pics, the springs and claw are underneath the bridge and dummy coil pickups. I've removed them so I could reset the claw for the bridge to float a little bit with a set of .010s on it. You can see in the pics, there are three sets of holes in the claw. Where it's mounted right now, is for .010's, but keeping the bridge flat against the body. The next two sets of holes,(moving away from the springs respectively), are for .009s, and .008s. To float the bridge, I had to move the claw to the center set of holes for .009s, and re-string it with .010s. Then, using the "Top Just" screw, (the allen head set screw you see in the center of the bridge, just behind the pivot blade), I can adjust the tension and set the float height with the guitar tuned to pitch. I also had to adjust the tilt neck adjustment on the back of the neck plate. to get the action as low as I like it.
   It's worked out surprisingly well, and I might keep it like this for a while. Either way, I'm glad I have one of the Elites again. It's definitely found a good home here.

[Dante]

That's nuckin' futz!

Dude must've had a few hits  :banana-rasta: :banana-rasta: :banana-rasta: before coming up with that arrangement, that's crazy. Thank you for showing me that while you had it apart

Seems like a complicated setup to avoid a hole in the back of the guitar.

Strangest guitar I've seen since this one (see below) I think I see a new thread coming about strange guitars  ::)