Telecaster choice

Not sure on the years they made the changes you are talking about, but remember they have the belly cut now too.

I love the American Deluxe too. The Olympic Pearl with tortoiseshell binding and PG is my personal favourite right now.

 

IDK either was some time ago that they used VN cause do not forget there was the Bill lawrence SCN guys for a few years.

N3's 2011 I think ?

 

I believe the N3s arrived in 2010.

I'd keep that American Standard personally and just upgrade it with the features you like on the Deluxe.

 

I don't mind them on either, in fact I wish they would add the arm contour too

 

I like that Am Std. I'm partial though, have one with a RW board. I did some pup swapping though. They would look nice together.

 

Good luck with your quest mate. Your current Blizzard Pearl is beautiful, but I'm with you, those Cherry Burst/Maple Deluxes have something special about them.

I'll own one some day as well.

 

Okay - there have been basically 3 (or maybe 3 1/2) versions of the American Deluxe Tele; there have been a lot of changes over years.

Generation 1.0 (1998-1999): all models had the bound body and belly cut (some transparent colors had an ash body; solid colors, 3-color burst and trans red were alder). Vintage noiseless pickups. The 1998s had the "Nashville" pickup set with a Strat pickup in the middle position, a 5-way switch and a mini-toggle to combine the neck & bridge pickups in positions 1 and 5 and give you all 3 pickups in position 2 and 4. Neck has rolled fingerboard edges, abalone dots, and the raised chrome headstock decal.

Generation 1.5 (1999-2003) Reverts to the traditional 2 pickup/3-way switch sometime between January and July 1999.

Generation 2 (2004-2009): Pickups change to SCNs, S-1 switch added, and contoured neck heel added. American Deluxe Ash Tele becomes a separate model that doesn't have binding or body contours and has a regular headstock decal.

Generation 3 (2010-present): Pickups change to N3s. Necks now are compound radius, abalone dots change to pearl dots on rosewood fingerboards and black pearl dots on maple fingerboards. American Deluxe Ash Tele gains the belly cut (that might have happened in 2012).

You will find early run Generation 3 American Deluxes with DZ9xxxxxx (2009) and "10xxxxxx" (early 2010) serial numbers as well as the US10, US11, US12, and US13 numbers. Fender started doing runs of these in late 2009 so they were ready to ship when released in early 2010, so there were several large runs with the 2009 numbers (not just the usual amount made during the annual decal changeover period).

 

That's probably about right; the 3rd Generations will likely go for a bit more than the 2nd Generation models; the Gen 3s might go for more like $1,000-$1,100. Sometimes the 1998 1st Generation "Nashville" styles will go for a bit more - you don't see them come up that often and if someone's really looking for one it will drive the ebay price up. On the other hand with the 1998s if no one's in the market for a Nashville the price will go down.

The wild card is the American Deluxe Power Tele - that is the "Generation 1.5" American Deluxe with a Fishman Power Bridge with the on-board Fishman preamp. There aren't many of them; I know they came out in 1999 and were discontinued some time before the change to the 2nd Generation happened but I'm not sure the exact year between 2001-2003 they were dropped. They will go for a bit more as well but I can't give you an approximate price.

 

Thanks, John, for that highly detailed post!

I am in trouble with the USA Deluxe people because I do not "get" this guitar. I mean, I liked the one a while back with the thicker neck, but for the most part, every feature that the Deluxe has over the USA Standard is one of those things I didn't ask for. I ended up buying a USA G + L ASAT Classic with binding, so I could have the "look" of some of these Deluxes and that scratched my itch. I think sidestepping the 60 cycle noise is better done with RWRP pickups and a 4 way so you can have in series or parallel, both fairly quiet. If you want fine fit and finish, just get a FCS Tele.

The USA Deluxe Tele and to some extent the USA Deluxe Strat are the "Desoto" of the FMIC Fender lineup. Other models got all the really cool features, and the Deluxe got window dressing. Too many other choices, and the suits at FMIC robbed from the Deluxes development and future or trajectory and gave the stuff to all these many other models. I mean, the 2013 is still using a version of the bridge that was cast off by the Series range when they reintroduced it as the American Standard in January of 2008. The saddles are a little nicer, but honestly, the Deluxe line has been cheated and left behind.