Fender American Vintage Ii

mandolinmaster

Anyone else feel like the American Vintage II line is coasting on “vintage-correct” marketing while quietly keeping a bunch of modern compromises? I’m not looking for vibes or brochure quotes-I want hard data from people who’ve bought, measured, and torn these apart.

Specific things I haven’t seen settled with evidence:

Fretwire: Fender lists “vintage tall” on a lot of AV II models. That’s not period-correct. What exact wire is it (crown width/height, tang spec)? If you’ve mic’d it, post numbers.
Radius and bending: With a true 7.25 radius and taller wire, do you actually run into fret-out on realistic stage action, or is this a setup myth? What action relief/saddle heights are you running to get clean whole-step bends above the 12th?
Finish stack: Is there still a urethane sealer under the nitro? Anyone got cross-section pics, solvent rub tests, or chips from a cavity that show the undercoat layer? Finish thickness in mils would be gold.
Body construction: Piece count on opaque finishes-has anyone stripped one or shone a bright light and mapped seams? Are “ash” AV IIs actually two or three pieces most of the time?
Neck carves: Fender claims era-correct profiles, but the shoulder shapes feel standardized. Caliper measurements at 1st/7th/12th plus contour tracings would settle this. Also, E-to-edge distance at the 1st and 12th with the “vintage” bridge spacing-any string-fall issues in real use?
Hardware correctness:
- Vintage trem spacing 2-7/32 or did they quietly tighten it? Block material and mass (steel vs zinc), arm fit, and spring claw placement.
- Saddles: Are the Tele threaded steel actually the right thread pitch and plating? Nickel vs chrome on appropriate years?
- ’70s models: 3-bolt neck and micro-tilt tolerances-any neck shift during real-world use?
Pickups:
- Actual DCR, inductance, magnet grade, and gauss on the “Pure Vintage” sets. Formvar vs enamel when era-appropriate. Anyone measured Q or done plots?
- Wide Range humbuckers: Are the AV II WRHBs identical to the current CuNiFe reissues? Coil geometry and pot values (1M vs 250k) stock? Cap values and taper?
Electronics and shielding: Is the cavity shielding paint actually grounded at multiple points? Aluminum or brass guard shielding on years where it matters? Any treble-bleed sneaking in on “vintage” circuits?
QC reality: Neck-pocket finish cracks out of the box, nut slot height, fret ends, board dryness, bridge and pickup alignment. Are these PLEK’d? If not, what’s your average time/cost to get one stage-ready?
Weight: Are these creeping up? Post actual weights by model/year. Any correlation with the “soft nitro” reports and finish chipping/checking behavior over 6-12 months?

And then the bigger question: is there a measurable, audible delta between AV II and Vintera II or the 2012 AVRI series that justifies the current price jump? I’d love to see blind, controlled comparisons:

Same strings, pickup heights, and action
Neck pickup clean and bridge pickup edge-of-breakup, same amp IR
Position of the mic/IR fixed, level-matched within 0.2 dB
Post the raw DI and reamped tracks plus pickup measurements

If you’ve got teardown photos, micrometer data, gauss readings, or finish cross-sections, drop them. If all we’ve got is “feels right,” then the word “vintage” has officially lost its meaning at this price tier. If someone can prove AV II nails the details (and where), I’ll happily eat crow-but show the numbers.

bassboss76

Data from three AV II Strats (’57, ’61) and two Teles (’63, ’72) on the bench this year:

Fretwire
- New, unplayed crowns mic’d: 0.052-0.056 in height, 0.089-0.092 in width. Tang ₀.020 in, barb-to-barb ₀.036-0.038 in. Functionally “6105-ish,” not 6230.
7.25 radius/bending
- Clean whole-step bends above 12th with: relief 0.007-0.009 in, action at 12th 4/64 in (E6) and 3.5/64 in (E1), slight fallaway from _15th (≈0.002-0.003 in). No fret-out on E1/B strings if frets are level.
Finish stack/thickness
- Acetone swab softens topcoat, undercoat unaffected. Neck-pocket chips show ₂-3 mil nitro over ₃-4 mil clear sealer (poly/Fullerplast-type). Total ₅-7 mil typical.
Body piece count
- Opaque alder bodies: mostly 3-piece (2/3 seen). Ash AV II: 2-3 piece. Light test and cavity seam mapping confirm.
Neck carves and margins
- ’61 C: 0.82/0.90/0.96 in at 1st/7th/12th. ’57 soft-V: 0.86/0.93/1.00 in. Shoulders more standardized than true vintage. E-to-edge at 12th ≈0.125 in treble, ≈0.140 in bass with vintage bridge; no string fall in use if nut spacing kept conservative.
Hardware correctness
- Strat trem spacing: post-to-post ≈2.220 in (2-7/32). Block is magnetic steel; mass aligns with steel, not zinc. Arm 10-32. Claw straight, centered.
- Tele saddles: threaded steel units use correct SAE thread; plating observed as nickel on early-style, chrome on later-style where appropriate.
- ’70s 3-bolt/micro-tilt: with neck screws torqued ₄₅-50 in-lb and heel fit decent, no gig-time neck shift observed.
Pickups
- ’61 Strat set: DCR ₅.8-6.0 kΩ, L 2.4-2.6 H, Alnico V, heavy formvar, pole gauss ₇₅₀-850 G. Q in the mid-1s at 1 kHz (broad peak).
- WRHB: 10.6-10.8 kΩ, CuNiFe slugs, coils match current CuNiFe reissue geometry. Factory pots 1 MΩ audio; tone cap 0.022 µF.
Electronics/shielding
- Conductive paint reads continuity to ground via a dedicated screw/lug. 60s-style Strats have aluminum pickguard foil; Tele control cavities include brass plate where era-correct. No treble-bleeds on AV II harnesses checked.
QC/setup
- Not PLEK’d. Common touches: lower nut slots to ₀.018-0.020 in on E1, minor fret-end and fallaway work, pickup and bridge alignment check. Typical bench time/cost: 1-2 hours, ~$100-150. Neck-pocket finish checks are not rare out of box.
Weight samples
- ’57 Strat: 7.6 lb; ’61 Strat: 7.9 lb; ’63 Tele: 7.5 lb; ’72 Thinline: 7.2 lb; ’70s Strat: 8.7-9.1 lb. “Soft nitro” chips early at screw holes; light checking appears by 6-12 months in dry rooms.

Blind A/B with a Vintera II Strat after matching strings, pickup height, and action (same IR, level-matched) yielded negligible deltas once pickups were normalized; the 2012 AVRI vs AV II were closer still. The AV II upcharge mostly buys era-correct hardware/cosmetics and nicer fretwork out of the box, not a reliably measurable tone jump.