It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Subscribe to our Patreon, and get image uploads with no ads on the site!
Selling my 1983 Fender Stratocaster.
This is one of the early models made by Fender after Dan Smith retooled the original Fullerton factory in ’81-’82 (which subsequently closed in ’85 with the acquisition from CBS and move to Corona). Note: this isn’t one of the crappy two-knob models that eBay sellers like to sell as “Dan Smith” Strats (despite him having nothing to do with the design and all of its corner-cutting) – it’s a proper one. Plays and sounds lovely, to be honest I’m sad to part with it. However I need to cut down my collection significantly so this is part of the cull.
For further reading on Dan Smith and this very interesting era of Fender, check out these articles:
https://www.stratcollector.com/news/dan-smith-stratocaster/
Anyway, on to the guitar!
Neck/Frets
The neck is a lovely single piece of maple with nice amounts of subtle flame and figuring throughout. It has a fairly ‘modern’ C-shape carve, nice and slim and easy to play. Taking the neck off reveals that it was carved by ‘J. Torres’, who I understand had been at Fender for a while and was quite prolific at neck carving. The heel is stamped 2 August 1983.
Frets are in wonderful condition, and the neck plays great all over – a wonderful piece of work, and you can really see the vast quality improvements that took place in this era of Fender.
Body
Great condition, with lovely proper 50s contours
– leaps and bounds ahead of the flat, slabbed rubbish Fender was making in the
70s.
As is typical for Strats of this era, the body is heavy. I don’t have scales to weight it, but I’d put about the same as a light Les Paul. This is due to the dense ash that the factory was using at the time, which appears to have been a preference of Dan and co (look at the Yamahas he was making before Fender and you’ll see similar weights).
Great condition, save for a crack in the bass-side neck pocket (finish ONLY - it looks worse than it is due to the thick finish they used at the time! The wood is perfect, and there is no crack in the neck pocket itself) and a chip inside the trem cavity (not visible if you use the back cover, as I do).
Pickups/electronics
Pickups are original, and sound fantastic – very loud and very clear. These include the hot “X-1” bridge pickup (indicated by the yellow/black wire pairing) that was introduced to 80s Stratocasters as part of the redesign. Very ‘stratty’ sounding – these pickups sound so good I’m struggling to part with the guitar, to be honest.
Pots look to be original, with the exception of the lower tone pot, which has been replaced with a “Sonic Ranger” preamp. These were made by MoPro, a Dutch company, in the 80s/90s, and gives a Varitone-style selection of tones which can be selected by the five-position tone pot. Sounds fantastic, to be honest, and gives a lovely selection of very nice tones – I understand that Andy Summers used these for a while.
Postage/shipping
The guitar is with me in NW London but I am happy to post.
80s Strats appear to be priced at £700-1100 for the POS two-knob models, £1300-2200 for the proper USA ones, and £2k+ for the Reissues.
I’m asking £1,650. Now £1500 Now £1100. Now £1000.
Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
Comments
This statement is partially correct. Some vendors do indeed misdescribe their 1983/84 American Standard Stratocasters as "Dan Smith" era.
I would argue that the revised guitars are not so much "crappy" as flawed and misguided. They can be improved - if you happen to like Kahler flatmount vibrato systems.
Are you 100% sure it's 1983 on the neck, and it isn't 1982 that's been smudged?
Is there something wrong with my ad or pictures?
It looks worse than it is due to the thick finish used in the 80s.