Fender Vintera '60s Jazzmaster Modified

review
FENDER VINTERA SERIES FENDER VINTERA SERIES
98
Guitarist october 2019
UNDER THE HOOD A look at the circuits of the Modifi ed models
R
emoving the Strat’s scratchplate displays
a sticker on the underside that reads
“Baja 60s Strat”. According to Fender’s
Tim Shaw, the term Baja – originating from the
location of Fender’s factory in Ensenada on
Mexico’s Baja California peninsula – “has been
a term used for some time on Ensenada models
with hotter pickups or more modern specs. So
what was ‘Baja’ in concept, and with varying specs
on the Classic Players, became ‘Modified’ in the
Vintera universe.”
You also see that the pickup and control routes
are cut
after the guitar has been finished, leaving
the wood bare: an attempt to let the wood breathe,
perhaps? The circuit typically uses a trio of 250k
pots (the volume being the S-1 four-pole push-
push switched type), a single .01 microfarad
(104k) tone cap and five-way pickup selector. The
tone controls are assigned, so tone 1 operates on
both the neck and middle pickups; tone 2 on the
bridge. The pickups have grey fibre bottoms with
quite a pronounced vintage stagger, and with both
the four-pole S-1 switch and a four-pole five-way
selector switch, it’s switch potential overkill: the
so-called ‘seven sound’ mod actually needs just a
single-pole two-way switch.
Our Tele achieves its additional series wiring
of both pickups (position 4) from the four-way
lever pickup selector switch. The S-1 switched
volume control uses two of its four poles to flip
the phase of the neck pickup, but a third pole
adds a .01 microfarads capacitor, wired to ground,
that applies a high-frequency roll-off to the neck
pickup (in position 2 only). Why? To create a
less ‘strangled’ sound (which we already have in
position 4 when the S-1 switch is depressed) to
the parallel mix that is similar to an out-of-phase
switch on a Les Paul, for example, where, with both
pickup volumes up, the sound is very thin, but pull
one volume back and the sound becomes fuller
with a hint of out-of-phase-ness. Both pots are
250k and the circuit uses a .05 microfarad (503)
ceramic disc tone capacitor.
Another nice vintage touch is the angled
slot between the pickups (underneath the
scratchplate) that channels the neck pickup wires
to the control cavity – a Tele feature from early
1951 through to mid-1969.
The Jazzmaster pretty much tears up the
rulebook: everything is different. Aside from the
pickup design, the Lead circuit uses 1meg-ohm
pots to maximise the treble response (the volume
unusually has a linear taper; the tone is audio or
logarithmic ) with a .03 microfarads (303M) tone
cap. The Rhythm circuit uses small ‘mini’ pots,
1meg linear for the volume and an unusual 50k
linear tone pot that pulls down the treble response.
The tone cap here is .02 microfarad. The pickups
look very vintage-y with grey fibre top and bottom
plates and, although the scratchplate ID sticker is
ripped here, you can clearly see “Baja” and “2019”.
Another consideration is hum cancellation.
The Jazzmaster’s pickups appear hum-cancelling
in mixed (both on) position. The Strat is hum-
cancelling in its standard mixes (bridge and
middle, and middle and neck), but neck and bridge
and all-three with the S-1 switch depressed seem
to be a little noisier in terms of hum pick-up than
the other mixes, but less so than the individual
single coils. The Tele is the least quiet and doesn’t
sound like it has any hum-cancelling, despite the
added series link of its two single coils.
TELE CIRCUIT
STRAT CIRCUIT
JAZZMASTER
RHYTHM CIRCUIT
Select both pickups in parallel and push
down that S-1 switch and it’s far from the
thin ‘strangled’ out-of-phase sound we
expect: it’s less nasal and adds more bass
back to create a very usable alternate mix
(see ‘Under The Hood’ below). But select
the series mix and hit the S-1 switch and it
really is a strangled thin tone, which might
work in a psychedelic funked-out and
effected setting, but we’d suspect many
might find it unusable.
Our Strat is perhaps slightly stiffer
sounding, slightly brighter than any of
our references and a little bass-light in
comparison. It’s not hotter than the Tele
or Jazzmaster and typically sounds very
cultured and refined. While we lack a little
woody depth from the neck, both mixes
excel: crisp, textured and bouncy, while
the solo bridge pickup is slightly smoother
in the high-end, probably because of its
dedicated tone control. But tonal shade
aside, it sounds like a Strat and as we get
used to its mettle, it does the job and proves
quite the all-rounder. The S-1 switch
performs the ‘seven sound’ mod by adding
the neck to the bridge pickup for, firstly,
a wider Tele-like mix and then all three
pickups together. No surprises, but we’re
far from disappointed.
There’s a noticeable earth hum with the
Jazzmaster on top of the usual hum pick-up
that will need some investigating, and the
combination of the different vibrato and
bridge – not to mention the wider flatter
single coils – gives a third and very distinct
voice that has more in common with a
two-pickup Telecaster in terms of the
bridge and mix voices, with more attack
and depth to the neck. The bridge pickup
is pretty much the brightest here, a real
toupee-lifter without the tone pulled back
a little that’s not quite as smooth as the
This ‘modern’ two-post vibrato uses
a die-cast block and has narrower-
than-vintage string spacing. Certainly
not a deal-breaker, just different
As your gateway to
the world of vintage
(and modifi ed
vintage) Fender,
these are hugely valid
VIDEO DEMO http://bit.ly/guitaristextra
GIT451.rev_fender.indd 98 05/09/2019 17:34