I'd like some help with a 1976 Strat I bought recently....My first 'real' guitar was a 1976 Tele which I love......Seeing as I don't have the money to buy earlier Fender models when this 1976 Strat turned up on ebay I decided to bite the bullet and get it with some of my inheritence money from my grandmother..I figured it was better than buying a car or squandering the cash and I would have something that I won't sell or wear out..Its the same year as my Tele....




The person I got it from assures me it is completely original and as far as I can see it is....He said he bought it brand new in 1976.....but I am a little dubious of a couple of things.....First is the machine heads...They look very new and don't have the same look as my Teles (see pics)..They are Fender ones a but the furules are larger and very shiney......The seller assures me they are untouched from original....

So my question is....Did Fender use this type of tuners on their 1976 Strats?.....or are mine after market tuners?

The other thing is the scratch plate...The screws are all phillips heads unlike the Teles which are flats....and the angles on the screws are not straight as if they have been put in through a scratch plate that was not perfectly aligned....

These are only small issues but I really wanted advise from folks who know what they are talking about with 70's Fenders..

Thanks in advance...Lew







PS...I posted this dilema over at 'Strat-Talk' and 'Tele-Forums' wth little help....

Do you have a pic of the back of the tuner too?

Yeah.....the back is the same as the new Fender '70's replacement ones.....It seems that only the chroming and the size of the ferrules are different...



I also have a couple of sets of the Fender '70's replacement tuners on other guitars and they are exactly the same as the ones on my 1976 strat.....The problem I have is that the tuners on my 1976 Tele are different...Look like they are nickel or something on the ferrules, stem and the on the bit that attaches the nob to the gear too.....

The only replacement "F" tuners available are the 2nd generation types with the thicker shaft, made by Schaller.
These don't fit without enlarging the neck tuner holes from the back

I just took off one of the tuners from my 1976 Tele, 1976 Strat and Fender replacement 2011.....The Tele tuner is very different from the others without the copper brace holding the gear in place that the other 2 have...There are differences between the 1976 Strat and the 2011 replacement, noticeably the base stalk is longer, there is no 'Made in Germany' stamp on the base of the replacement and it is 2 mm shorter...Also the chrome cover is slightly less rounded and the 'F' logo is not as chunky and more delicate...The replacement tuner would fit the 1976 Strat with no modifictions



Strat 1976 tuner



Tele 1976 tuner



Fender 2011 replacement tuner



The only conclusion I have so far is that the 1976 Strat tuners are not the recent replacement ones......but....Could they be an earlier replacement tuner or are they original?

Welcome to the Forum Lew. If you ever need to supplement your guitar playing income you'd make a great photographer

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you can save the world with your guitar one love song at a time it's just better, more fun, easier with a fender solid body electric guitar or electric bass guitar.

Hehe....and all taken with a phone.....actually I work as a designer so it comes with the territory a bit...thanks for the compliment

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With information here and on other websites I have posted..:

I'm getting the feeling that the tuners were changed to the 'copper brace' style tuners sometime in 1976....If that is the case it would be a way for folks to tell whether their Fender is an early '76' or late '76' model

so....

If you have tuners that look nickel (instead of chrome) and the gearing has no copper brace under the cover, and your covers have small holes in at the base of the shaft then your guitar is an early 1976...if not then your guitar is a late 1976

Is that statement true?