One of my favorite Fender basses and a bit of an oddball. They pop up in conversations here once and awhile and I usually pop into them but there has never been an official thread for them and lots of the info in the other threads is questionable. So here it is...a place to discuss the Bullet bass, show yours off, ask questions...whatever!
Bullet bass info (if there is something I got wrong I will update this):
The Fender Bullet bass was introduced in 1982. It featured an alder body and a maple neck with a maple fretboard. There was never a rosewood fretboard option. It featured a tele headstock and the nut width was a 1 ⅝” B width. The profile (as typical for the early 80’s) was thin from front to back. Some of them had a more pronounced V shape but that was probably just variance from neck to neck and not an actual different profile. Similarly some had walnut skunk stripes while others had a maple skunk stripe. The tuners were vintage style but with small shafts. The body was a scaled down Precision shape and was available in vintage white, red and black as standard options and sunburst or mocha/walnut for an additional fee. The pickup was a split single coil similar to a Mustang pickup. The story goes that they actually WERE leftover Mustang pickups but I don’t really know how to verify that. Structurally they look the same as what was being used for Mustangs in the late 70’s early 80’s so it’s possible. It’s also possible they were just made the same way so look the same but weren’t really “leftover”.
The Fender version came in two versions: a long scale “Deluxe” version (B-34) and a short scale version (B-30). The body for the long scale version was slightly different/larger than the short scale version but they used the same pickguard so the B-34 has a pickguard that doesn’t follow the contours of the bass as well as the B-30 does. Some of the pickguards on the B-34 had the B-34 moniker pressed into it. I have never seen that on a B-30 but its possible it happened. To the best of my knowledge while manufactured in 1982 almost all Bullets had a 1980 serial number with an occasional 1981 serial number (although that is much rarer). None that I have ever seen had an 82 serial number.
After a year of production in the USA production was moved to Japan and the Bullet was sold under the Squier name. The differences between the USA and Japanese ones are:
- The short scale version was completely dropped but they used the smaller B-30 body size so the pickguards all fit well on these.
- The “Deluxe” title was no longer used
- The pickguards on the Squier version used 10 screws while the USA version used 12.
- The body was made of basswood vs alder
- The colors were reduced to black, sunburst and red only (red seems to be the rarest color)
- The tuners were long shaft vintage style
- The neck profile was just slightly thicker and more of a classic C.
Production lasted for about two years and all used a SQ serial number. There is a rumor that USA bodies and necks were sent to Japan however there is no evidence that is true and it’s highly unlikely especially considering that with the new management switchover USA production was slowing down and the Japanese plant was highly regarded as being as good.
