An Absolutely Mint As New Candy Apple Red 1966 Fender Stratocaster With All The Case Candy And More!

1966 Fender Stratocaster

This absolutely mint Candy Apple Red Stratocaster weighs 8.50 lbs. and has a nut width of 1 5/8 inches and a scale length of 25 1/2 inches. Solid alder body, contoured on back and lower bass bout. One-piece maple neck with a nice thick profile. Veneer rosewood fretboard with 21 original jumbo frets and pearloid dot position markers. Single "butterfly" string tree with nylon spacer. Large headstock with 'Transition' logo with "Fender" in gold with black outline, "STRATOCASTER" in black beside it, "WITH SYNCHRONIZED TREMOLO" in black below it, and two patent numbers "2,741,146", "3,143,028" and "DES 169,062" below that. Individual 'double-line' Kluson Deluxe tuners with oval metal buttons and "D-169400 / Patent No." stamped on the underside. Four-bolt neck plate with serial number "135832" between the top two screws. Three single-coil light gray bottom pickups with staggered polepieces and nicely matched outputs of 5.54k, 5.72k, and 5.51k. The undersides of all three pickups have "5-2-66" written in pencil. Three-layer plastic pickguard (white/black/white) with eleven screws and full-size aluminum 'shield' on the underside. Three controls (one volume, two tone) plus three-way selector switch, all on pickguard. White plastic Stratocaster knobs with greenish gold lettering. Fender "Synchronized Tremolo" combined bridge/tailpiece. The neck is stamped "13 MAR 66 B"; the potentiometers are all stamped "137 6549" (CTS December 1965). There is one tiny 'ding' (the size of a matchhead) on the on the top, below the vibrato tailpiece, near the lower strap button and two tiny 'dings' on the back of the neck behind the 4th fret. The original jumbo 0.09 frets show miniscule wear to the first two frets only - this guitar has been played a few times - but certainly always babied! With this miniscule triviality said, this guitar is so mint - it is unbelievable. The color is rich and vibrant and shows no sign of fade whatsoever. By far the finest Candy Apple Red Stratocaster of any year that we have ever seen - a 9.50 rating does not do this guitar justice! Complete with the original tremolo arm, original bridge cover, black leather Fender Guitar Strap, original gray guitar cord and the original bridge adjustment allan-key in its manilla envelope. Also included is the original Fender 12-page hang-tag with matching serial number, and even the original receipt from Ludwig Music House in St. Louis, MO, and 'Missouri Retail Time Contract' (hire-purchase agreement) dated "8-12-66", an original 8-page October 1966 Fender Fine Instruments Price List and a 12-page 1965-66 Fender catalog… Housed in its original Fender black hardshell case with black leather ends and dark orange plush lining (9.25).

"The Stratocaster was launched during 1954 [and was priced at $249.50, or $229.50 without vibrato]...The new Fender guitar was the first solidbody electric with three pickups [Gibson's electric-acoustic ES-5, introduced five years earlier, had been the overall first], meaning a range of fresh tones, and featured a new-design vibrato unit that provided pitch-bending and shimmering chordal effects. The new vibrato -- erroneously called a 'tremolo' by Fender and many others since -- was troublesome in development. But the result was the first self-contained vibrato unit: an adjustable bridge, a tailpiece, and a vibrato system, all in one. It wasn't a simple mechanism for the time, but a reasonably effective one...Fender's new vibrato had six bridge-pieces, one for each string, adjustable for height and length, which meant that the feel of the strings could be personalized and the guitar made more in tune with itself...The Strat came with a radically sleek, solid body, based on the outline of the 1951 Fender Precision Bass. Some musicians had complained to Fender that the sharp edge of the Telecaster's body was uncomfortable...so the Strat's body was contoured for the player's comfort… Even the jack socket mounting was new, recessed in a stylish plate on the body face...the Fender Stratocaster looked like no other guitar around especially the flowing, sensual curves of that beautifully proportioned, timeless body. The Stratocaster's new-style pickguard complemented the lines perfectly, and the overall impression was of a guitar where all the components ideally suited one another. The Fender Stratocaster has since become the most popular, the most copied, the most desired, and very probably the most played solid electric guitar ever" (Tony Bacon, 50 Years of Fender, p. 18).