I love my American deluxe. That said I had to send three of them back to MF for issues ranging from neck pocket gaps to gashes in the neck or body. But my most played strat is my Robert Cray sig strat. I picked it up used and it just feels perfect to me. I've been really impressed with the higher end mexi fenders, like the classic players. My only CIJ fender is my Jaguar HH, which didn't impress me much, but most other Japanese guitars I've played have been flawless. If you look long enough I'm sure you will find a nice Mexi, but as mentioned by cratz2, there is a lot more consistency with the MIA & CIJ guitars
as far as the S1 switching, its nice but it scares me as one more thing that could go wrong. It basically gives you more tonal variety. Mine is a SSS and flipping on the S1 gives each position a fatter feel, which is great but when I go for my strat, I'm grabbing it for the quack and feel of the strat, if I need a fat tone, I grab a HB guitar; so I typically don't use it much.
I picked my Am deluxe up for 999 new from MF. I didn't feel it was a bargain, but I did feel it was a warm deal. I do not think they are worth the 1500+ that they are usually marked. Also, some the neck is different on the deluxe I believe, I'm ok with it, but steveman returned his I believe bc he couldn't bind with it like his Am standard
