Olympic White Factory Bigsby Telecaster.

1972 Fender Telecaster (Factory Bigsby).

A rare Olympic White 1972 factory Bigsby Telecaster that weighs just 7.70 lbs. and has a nice comfortable nut width of just under 1 5/8 inches and a scale length of 25 1/2 inches. Solid alder body and one-piece fretted maple neck (with a skunk stripe) with 21 original medium frets and inlaid black dot position markers. The neck profile is consistently medium-to-thick all the way up the fretboard starting at 0.85 inches at the first fret and gently rising to 0.94 inches at the 12th fret. Individual Fender "F" tuners with octagonal metal buttons. Headstock decal with "Fender" logo in black with gold trim, "Telecaster" in black beside it, and two patent numbers "2,573,254" and "3,143,028" beneath "Fender." Single "butterfly" string tree with large nylon spacer. Four-bolt neck plate with large Fender "F" logo and serial number "327402" between the top two screws. One plain metal-cover pickup (at neck) with a really hot output of 8.00k and one black six-polepiece pickup (angled in bridgeplate) with an output of 6.46k. Three-layer (white/black/white) plastic pickguard with eight screws. Two controls (one volume, one tone) plus three-way selector switch with black plastic "Top-Hat" tip, all on metal plate adjoining pickguard. Chrome knobs with flat tops and knurled sides. Fender factory 'floating' bridge with six 'ridged' saddles and factory Bigsby tremolo tailpiece. The neck is stamped in black "3 SEP 72B" and the pots are stamped "137 6632" & "137 6636" (CTS, July & August 1966). There is some finish checking on the body and a few small surface chips or wear - mainly on the bass top edge. The maple fret-board and original medium frets show very little sign of wear. The neck pickup was not sounding or reading correctly so we had it professionally recovered by master luthier Scott Lentz - and it now sounds absolutely amazing. Overall this guitar is in exceptionally fine (9.00) condition. Complete with the original Fender owners manual. Housed in its original three-latch Fender rectangular black hardshell case with black leather ends and red plush lining (9.00).

"The Bigsby vibrato tailpiece was first listed as an option in 1967...Guitars with a Bigsby tailpiece feature a six-piece bridge with threaded saddles and a base plate without any marking" (A.R. Duchossoir, The Fender Telecaster, p. 68). Because this guitar has a proper factory Bigsby, the strings don't go through the body, like they do on all Telecasters (except those made in 1958), and there are no ferrules on the back of the guitar.