
For example, if your silverface super reverb has transformer codes all from 1974, it was made in 1974! Let’s say the weeks are 27, 29, 33, 41. Use the latest one to give you a good idea of when it was made. They are all usually within a few months of each other.
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This code can be found on the power transformer, output transformer, choke, and reverb transformer. If it’s a silverface amp, that 6 indicates 1976. Now if it’s a blackface amp, it’s a safe bet that 6 means 1966. In the above example, the transformer was made in either 1966 or 1976, week 45. The first of the three digits tells us the last digit of the year (unfortunately not decade specific) and the last two numbers tell us the week.

The date is in the last three digits, after the 606 –. Most post tweed Fenders had trannys manufactured by Schumacher. If your tweed champ is stamped HH, it was made in 1958/August.Īnother way to get a close estimate of when your amp was made is to read the codes on the transformers. So if your blackface amp has a date code stamp of OB, it was made in 1965/February. The tube chart date code works like this: the first letter indicates the year and the second letter indicates the month. Up until the end of the blackface era (1967), all amps left the factory with a tube chart that had a two letter date code stamped on it.

There are some exceptions and some overlap, but the general idea is this: Tweeds (early 50’s to very early 60s), Browns (1960 – 1962), Blondes (1962 – 1963), Blackface (1963 – 1967), and Silverface (1967 – 1981). First, to get a general idea,there’s the appearance/style of the amp. There are some easy ways to find out when your vintage Fender was manufactured.
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Other websites might be scam ones so I’d focus on using Guitar Insite or the Fender Website. Pickups are not a good reference because they are easily changed, and Noiseless ones (the vintage) are a favorite forgery target (check bottom of pickup). The other defining features are headstock shape, location of the decals, font of the serial number, truss rod hole (big indicator). It could be a forgery (less likely if the serial is correct). Keep in mind, when trying to figure out your Stratocaster pay attention to the features that came out the year it was released. It’s not perfect but it’s mostly awesome! Fender Spec Sheet Serial Number Lookupįender also lets you register you guitar which tells you (Most of the time) if it exists but does not give you any specifications at all other than the “catalog” description in a one liner.

Here is Fenders “new” lookup page which will give you detail specs on a given model.
