65 Tele Questions

I've had this Tele for about 20 years or so. It has a neck date of Dec 65, yet has the old spaghetti logo. Everything on the guitar appears original except for the refinished body. Would the spaghetti logo have been put on guitars as late as Dec 65? I have never even cleaned this guitar and there is the typical "old" dirt around the decal and tuners so I seriously doubt its a repro decal...it has sat in the case under my bed for at least 20 years. I've been pulling some old guitars out and became curious after researching this one a little. Thanks for any help.
John

 

What makes me feel its original is the fact that the decal has a small piece missing in the area of the middle patent number....my bad. The wood where this piece came off is much lighter in color than the rest of the head, indicating to me that it has been covered by the decal for a long time. All the hardware including pickups, pots, knobs, etc look to be original and date correct. One other thing that puzzles me is the neck plate is L51***. You might expect to see a later number but yet I've seen late 64 Tele's with L4**** so I'm not sure about this. Some books indicate that Fender factory would just grab neck plates out of a box with little regard for number sequences. At that time no one probably cared about it much. I've read that the neck plate and true date of manufacture can vary quite a bit and that the "ranges" for neck plate numbers and dates are just ranges. Any thoughts on this? I bought this from an old guys estate so I'm pretty sure it wasnt messed with. Evidently he had it refinished in the early 70's...it looks to have been blonde originally. The back of the neck is nearly devoid of finish showing that the heck was played out of it. I had over 30 guitars which I've sold off over the last 18 months. This is one of 5 I have left. I'm not asking these questions because I want to sell it but rather out of curiosity. My daughter has dibbs on this one anyhow..

 

Slack,
Thanks for all the info.
Yes, the guitar body was refinished but not the neck. The electronics etc are correct for the guitar so I dont think anything was changed out in this area. The decal looks right from what info I can gather. The repro decals are supposed to have a "rounded e" on the fender name instead of the sharp edge as on this tele. On Tele's the spaghetti logo was used from 1950 until late 65 and the transition logo from late 65 until 1967. So there seems to be an overlap. On strats, the spaghetti logo was used from 1954 until the fall of 1964. Transition logo from fall 1964 to 1967 so an overlap on the strats also.
Several sources state that the neck plates used in 1965 were from L50,000's to L90,000's as well as the "F" stamped 100,000's so I guess the neck plate falls into the correct range.
As far as the decal placement...I'll have to disagree with you. It looks to be in the exact spot it belongs according to the few examples I've seen, pictures I've found on the net and page 51 in Duchossoir's book.
I'm going to venture that it is an original late 65 Tele that has had the body refinished and has all its original parts including decal, L plate and electronics/hardware. I cant find anything definative to disprove it at this point short of having it professionally evaluated. Any other comments appreciated.
Thanks to everyone for their insights.
John

 

Man, you've got me lookin'!
The decal is all one piece so the "screened" lettering is on a one piece background. I took a straight edge with 1/32" increments and looked at the decal in Duchossoir's book. The bottom edge of the{ e-n-d-e }on the Fender logo are on the same line. The bottom of the r at the end of the logo is approx. 1/16" higher than the previous letters. This means the "T" in TELECASTER is closer to the "e" in Fender than the "C" in TELECASTER is to the "r" in fender. True in the book and true on my Tele.....gives the impression that the "TELECASTER" part slants down slightly. I think I'm going cross eyed at all this inspection but its good to know the details.

 

Slack,
I see what you are saying about the decal. Mine appears to be higher than the example you gave. The one on page 49 of Duchossoir's book is also closer to the example you gave. Since the decals were most likely placed by hand, would it be reasonable to assume that there could be this much variation in the production line. Since CBS was firmly in control at this point in 65 and it is pretty well known that they were using up whatever stock was left from the Leo days; could this guitar have been assembled by new CBS employees using old stock? The question I have is why would anyone go to the trouble 20+ years ago to put a repro spaghetti logo on a Dec 65 neck and find a L50,000 plate? If it had a transition logo and a Early F plate...so what! Why replace a transition logo and an F plate? It just doesnt make sense. Because it falls in the "overlap" period...I'm going to assume its a early 66 tele as you suggest. I forget the pot dates cause I havent looked at it in years but I'm going to take off the strings and look at everything again. So Duchossoir's book has some inconsistencies? A couple websites said spaghetti logos and L plates made it on to some examples from early 1966 due to the fact that the old stock was being used up...do you agree with this?
Thanks
John