Abstract
The Nilsson mean-field plus the extended pairing model for well-deformed nuclei is applied to some representative rare earth examples. The binding energies, some low-lying pair-excited states and even-odd mass differences of Er, Yb and Hf isotopes are calculated systematically within the proton frozen-pair excitation limit. A comparison with experimental data for these nuclei shows that the results of the extended pairing model are better than those for the standard pairing model with the BCS approximation and the nearest-orbit pairing model.