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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Thu Dec 20, 2012 12:45 pm
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matthewweisberg wrote:
Wow. Great info John. I guess the only question I have now is why the body has no stamping or ID other than the big magic marker "X". Most I've seen have markings or stampings. Maybe the neck is original and the body isn't?


No, the body looked original to me since it has the righ micro-tilt on it. I suppose it could have been refinished and any stickers in the cavity were removed at that time. The only things I could see that that aren't original are the bridge pickup since it says it's a Seymour Duncan and those graphite string trees (originals were the bent "butterfly" metal). Not sure about the neck pickup; you would have to remove it and see if it's a Fender or a replacement.

It's buried in the long post but the standard tone control is correct for a 1983/84 CBS Standard Tele or Strat; Fender was only using the "double tone control" or "TBX" on the Elite models during those years. The American Standards did, however, have the TBX tone control (that double pot) from their introduction a the end of 1986 until about 1999 or so.


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2012 11:35 am
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Ok John. Hope you're still out there... I have One last question.

If all the inventory came back from Japan to either Fullerton or Corona, it it a reasonable assumption that FMIC exhausted said inventory of parts as they did the decals? In other words is it possible that within this era could be quite a number of E3 and E4 series "Made in the USA" Telecasters using Japanese parts such as necks, bodies, electronics, etc.? What jumps out at me, and I may be misinformed, is the volume control. I was under the assumption that it should be the Fender trademark brown fiber while this and a number of others I've seen are translucent white. And, the nut on the neck is down a bit. I've been told it should be almost flush. Is there a way to check the neck by spec?


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2012 1:21 pm
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matthewweisberg wrote:
Ok John. Hope you're still out there... I have One last question.

If all the inventory came back from Japan to either Fullerton or Corona, it it a reasonable assumption that FMIC exhausted said inventory of parts as they did the decals? In other words is it possible that within this era could be quite a number of E3 and E4 series "Made in the USA" Telecasters using Japanese parts such as necks, bodies, electronics, etc.? What jumps out at me, and I may be misinformed, is the volume control. I was under the assumption that it should be the Fender trademark brown fiber while this and a number of others I've seen are translucent white. And, the nut on the neck is down a bit. I've been told it should be almost flush. Is there a way to check the neck by spec?


I'm not quite following you; what do you mean by "inventory" - parts or complete guitars? As far as I've researched Fender never sent parts over to Japan during the CBS era, and they were only importing completed guitars there during the 1985-1986 era. Now if we were talking about Kramer or even Schecter we would be talking about having to figure out where the bodies and necks were made (in Schecter's case this only covers guitars built from 1984-1986 with the Dallas, TX neck plates).

For the later HM Strats built in 1988 they did send over USA-made pickups (Fender's own single coils and DiMarzio humbuckers) and USA made bridges. However, an MIJ guitar having USA components was nothing new - most Japanese manufacturers at that time were offering at least a few models with USA-built Kahler bridges or maybe USA-made pickups.

As far as I know any Fender from that 1983-1986 era that is marked "Made in USA" was really made in the USA - that is at least the body, neck, pickups, bridge, and anything else Fender made in-house. Who knows where they were sourcing pots, switches, etc. during that time; it is possible that they for a while used the same electronic parts like that as Fujigen, who was making the Japanese-built Fenders at that time period. Since at least the bridge pickup on your Tele has been changed it is also possible that the volume control was changed at that same time. It's also possible that the nut has been replaced.

However, all those changes do not alter the fact that you have a Fender Tele made in the Fullerton plant with a neck date of December 1983. This was before they shut down production in Fullerton. It just has some modifications done to it (or at least replacement parts installed), as might be expected for an approximately 29-year-old guitar.


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:33 pm
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Ok. Just that I'm in the manufacturing business and if they printed that many decals and other stuff I'm betting they made a ton of parts. Economy of scale. They had a ton of inventory on other parts. Did they dump it or just send it back to the US? They certainly didn't build them all out did they? I would also assume they didn't get stamped until assembly. So, an inventory of unstamped Japanese necks comes to Fullerton and what do you do with them? Just wondering.


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 8:25 am
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matthewweisberg wrote:
Ok. Just that I'm in the manufacturing business and if they printed that many decals and other stuff I'm betting they made a ton of parts. Economy of scale. They had a ton of inventory on other parts. Did they dump it or just send it back to the US? They certainly didn't build them all out did they? I would also assume they didn't get stamped until assembly. So, an inventory of unstamped Japanese necks comes to Fullerton and what do you do with them? Just wondering.


No, you're only thinking of the manufacturing side of the operations, not how the business entities were organized. Fender Japan was always a separate corporate entity from Fender's USA operations. Futher, Fender Japan was not a manufacturing entity; they were an marketing/design entity that utilized existing Japanese factories as OEM manufacturers for their product. These independent factories included Fuji Gen Gakki (now called FujiGen) who also produced instruments under their Greco name and for Hoshino under the Ibanez name. Eventually Fender Japan switched production from FujiGen to either Fernandez or Tokai (I forget which but that's when they went from "Made in Japan" to "Crafted in Japan" on the MIJs). Since these are OEM supplier they are only going to make the number of instruments that Fender USA orders - if they order 5,000 Teles, then FujiGen is only going to make 5,000 Teles. Yes, some parts eventually went over to Japan like the Kahler trems they used on the HMs and some other MIJ models. That was nothing new as Kahler, DiMarzio, Duncan and other companies accepted orders for parts from FujiGen, Tokai, Fernadez, Aria, etc.

Now some parts like pots, switches, tuners, etc. were purchased in large quantities and they went from Fullerton to Corona. They wouldn't have gone over to Japan as Fender didn't have a Japanese factory; they used OEM suppliers who had their own sources of these parts. Per Rob's timeline CBS stopped producing bodies, necks, etc. circa the end of the second quarter of 1984, then only kept on assembly personnel to finish putting together all the bodies and necks they had for their multiple lines (Standards, Elites, and Vintage Reissues) during the 3rd quarter of 1984. These assembly workers were also laid off by seniority as the stockpiles of bodies and necks dwindled down, with the last pieces assembled in September 1984. FMIC takes over in early February, leases the Fullerton factory month-to-month until they can find their own space, then they move everything left over from CBS's operations in Fullerton that they purchased to Corona and reopen there in July 1985. While their USA production starts from a very low number in October 1985 it does ramp up. In the meantime they import completed guitars from Japan, not parts, which are clearly marked as "Made in Japan".

As I've mentioned a few time the only parts that come from Japan to the USA happen later - circa 1988-1991 for models such as the HM Strat and other oddball models that have visual cues like Kahler Spyder trems. Think only models like the HM Teles, the variation of the Standard that had the Spyder, things like that. The one defining feature of all the oddball models that could be using MIJ parts is that they are not marked for country of origin at all (exclusive of the angled neck plate on some that just said "Fender U.S.A."; it did not say "Made in USA").


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 9:14 am
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Ok. Guess that pretty much sums it up. I do think the whole decal thing is really odd. Whose bright idea was that? Putting serial numbers from a series made in Japan on US models? That's the only reason I question whether or not some of the raw materials came over to California from Japan. Plus keeping on employees to finish the last of the inventory? Not very smart business and very expensive when you're at such low production rates as you indicated.

From what you've said I probably do have to assume I have one of the oddballs though. But I plan on making it a keeper so who cares! :-) Thanks again for all the help.


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Post subject: Re: Strange Fake Telecaster... I think
Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2012 12:40 pm
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matthewweisberg wrote:
Ok. Guess that pretty much sums it up. I do think the whole decal thing is really odd. Whose bright idea was that? Putting serial numbers from a series made in Japan on US models? That's the only reason I question whether or not some of the raw materials came over to California from Japan. Plus keeping on employees to finish the last of the inventory? Not very smart business and very expensive when you're at such low production rates as you indicated.

From what you've said I probably do have to assume I have one of the oddballs though. But I plan on making it a keeper so who cares! :-) Thanks again for all the help.


No, I wouldn't say this is one of the oddballs at all - you have a 100% made in USA 1983 Tele. It looks just like every other Standard Tele I saw in stores in 1983 and 1984. Measure the neck width - it should be pretty close to 1.700" wide at the nut. The only oddball things about it are post-production mods of at least a replaced bridge pickup and string trees. It wouldn't be unusual for the nut to be replaced or adjusted, and it isn't out of the realm of possibility that some tech threw in that volume pot or that, in order to meet the price point for the Standard Strat and Standard Tele Fender did indeed source the pots from the same supplier that FujiGen and other Japanese manufacturers used. At least here in the USA they were using the "Squier" name on all their MIJ models in 1983.

Actually it goes the other way around for the serial numbers - whose bright idea was it to put serial numbers starting with "E" on the MIJ guitars? Fender had established the use of "E" = "Eighties" and the first digit = the year long before the MIJ guitars changed from the Squier name to the Fender name. While the Strats and Teles were kind of screwed up in the 1980-1982 era, other models like the Leads and the Bullets had the "proper" E serial numbers - in fact my late 1979 Lead II has an "E0xxxxx" number - I suspect that Fender didn't bother to have headstock decals with "S9xxxxx" made up for the Leads since they weren't introduced until September of 1979. The difference is on the MIJ guitars the first digit after the "E" means nothing; on the USA guitars the first digit is supposed to indicate the year of manufacture. So there were plenty of MIJ Fenders out in 1985 with serial numbers that read "E6xxxxx", "E7xxxxx" and "E8xxxxx" all at the same time because the numbers after the "E" were kind of random. However, they used a different font and a different color for the serial numbers on the MIJs.


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