Post
by Larry Mal » Mon Nov 11, 2019 8:18 am
Well, the body is almost certainly a 1981 or so, since they only made that kind of Telecaster shape around that time. By 1982, they had changed to a stripped down Strat shape, then they expanded the Bullet line pretty deeply to include three single coil models, as well as single and double humbucker models, and the bass guitars.
By 1984 the entire Bullet concept had been moved to Fender Japan, which made Bullet type guitars for only a little while before the Squier Bullet became just a Stratocaster type guitar.
So this American made Telecaster type shape was only made in 1981 or thereabouts. Most of them are laminate, like this one is, but some of them are solid wood. By the 1982 Strat shape Bullets, though, those were all solid wood guitars.
I am pretty sure that the neck is a very early model, likely a 1981 as well, since the earliest Bullets had the offset "F" shape tuners like you can see on this one, but Fender very early on switched to the two-pin Fender type tuners that they still use today. So my guess is that this is actually a 1981 neck but I could be wrong, Fender was pretty sloppy and they were just using up whatever they had laying around for the Bullet.
Except, though, the necks. You always hear that Fender just used up old Telecaster necks but it's not true, the necks aren't actually the same, the Bullet has an extended headstock compared to the Telecaster. It's subtle, but it's there, and the necks were specially made for the Bullets.
The guy who designed this is a very nice man called John Page, and I've actually corresponded with him a bit. He's very flattered that people like his Bullets still. He also mentioned that he was mandated by Fender to design a guitar that cost no more than $60* to produce, so they could sell it for around $200 and still make money. But he says that he couldn't quite hit that, he got it around $62 but they went with it.
Bullets are great, though. They are long scale Fender guitars with the usual excellent Fender necks on there, I think Fender necks are just wonderful. They have the 7.25" radius at this point, they're pretty narrow at the nut, the neck carve can be all over the place but they all pay well that I've seen. The pickups are old Mustang pickups, they sound different in the long scale guitars, though. And the pick guards are most commonly a single piece of thick metal- steel or something magnetic- with the saddles attached directly to the pickguards.
Seems weird but it actually works out great, and I don't know why more people don't do it that way. The metal pickguard is good shielding, feels great, and it's a sensible design overall.
Frankly of all the guitars that Fender should be reissuing I have no idea why they don't re-visit the Bullet and the Lead- although neither of those guitars really offer anything all that different from the Strat and the Tele, I guess.
*I'm pretty sure he said $60- something like that.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.
