These are my favorite production guitars ever made. Mr. Fender had a 10 year non compete after he sold Fender to CBS in 1965. He had a mostly ceremonial consultant role with CBS 65-75. But he was still in his prime as an engineer / designer. He had a lot of great ideas that ether CBS didn’t care about or he saved for this project. Every detail of the guitar was improved and the overall build quality rivals pre-cbs Fender. But yet they failed in the market. The basses kicked ass but guitars ether as the Stingray 76-77 or Sabre 78-80 (never made concurantly)never caught on. Only a few brand highlights that i can think of… Paul Barreré used a Stingray on “waiting for Columbus”. one of the greatest live albums by Little Feat (great guitar tones) and seem in the movie “Stop Making Sense” funk guitarist Alex Weir uses a Sabre all night. Because they didn’t catch on , great deals can be found. I have 4 in my collection but don’t need 2 natural Stingrays.
This is nice clean example that has 2 upgrades.
1. Tuners on stock models were awful. These have been replaced with great Hipshot gears that need no drilling for installation so the original tuners (included) can be put back.
2. Knurled chrome knobs (with no indicator lines) have been replaced with high quality radio that do have an indicator line. original knurled not included.
other than that it’s what you would expect to see from a near 50 year old guitar finished in nitro.
The case is hardshell and not original