Fender White Steel

Fender White Steel
Manufacturer	Fender
Period	1956–1981
Construction
Body type	Solid
Neck joint	Bolt-on
Scale	24 or 22.5 in (610 or 572 mm)
Woods
Body	Usually Poplar Alder Ash
Neck	Maple
Fretboard	Usually Rosewood Maple
Hardware
Bridge	Fender "Dynamic" Vibrato
Pickup(s)	2 proprietary single coils
Colors available
Daphne Blue, Dakota Red, Olympic White, Competition Red, Competition Blue, Competition Orange, Sunburst

The White Steel was a steel guitar made by the Fender company. It was released as a student model in 1956 and was sold with the matching amplifier. ^[1]

Electrics

Each neck had two single-coil pickups. These could be blended by a small wheel attached to a pot that sat just behind the bridge, introduced in 1956. The bridge pick-up was always on, and the neck pickup could be fed in to taste using the blend pot. Because the pickups were wired with reversed polarities, blending in the neck pickup caused the pickups to be "hum-bucking". A neck selector switch controlled which neck's pickups were 'live'. On earlier 1950s models, the neck selector was controlled by push-buttons. A single tone and a single volume control served the entire instrument.

Scale lengths

The original 1956 models had a long scale length, at 26". From 1964 the scale length was reduced, and two shorter lengths were available, 24.5" and 22.5", both with 31 frets. To determine the guitar's scale count the markers past the 24th fret; there are 2, 3, and 4 markers for the 22.5", 24.5", and 26" guitars respectively.

References

1. Teagle, John; John Sprung (1995). Fender Amps: The First Fifty Years. Hal Leonard Corporation. p.  29. ISBN   978-0-7935-3733-4.
   "A new steel-guitar-and-amp set for students was marketed by Fender starting in '55 and ran a number of years, under the “White” name. ... Named in appreciation of plant manager Forrest White, these were probably made to get more inexpensive steels and amps into the market without offending authorized Fender dealers. (See page 185)"