- Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style
- Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style
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- Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit Single Cut
- Electric Guitar Kit SC-Style
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Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style
Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style
- Complete DIY (do it yourself) kit
- Bolt-on neck attachment
- Rengas body (wood colour may vary)
- Maple neck
- Double action truss rod
- Amaranth fretboard
- Dots fretboard inlays
- Radius: 350 mm
- 22 Frets
- Scale: 648 mm
- Nut width: 42 mm
- Truss rod
- 3 Ceramic single coil pickups
- Electronics: 1 Volume, 2 Tone, 5-Way switch
- Chrome hardware
- Diecast machine heads
- Tremolo
- .009 — .042 Strings
- Colour: Natural
Note: The body and neck have been primed with pore filler, making them suitable for the direct application of lacquer finishes. Before the application of stains or other surface treatments, the primer must be first removed via sanding.
Note: A certain degree of skill in handiwork is required for successful assembly of the guitar.
Further Information
Colour | Natural |
---|---|
Body | Solid Wood |
Top | None |
Neck | Maple |
Fretboard | Amaranth |
Frets | 22 |
Scale | 648 mm |
Pickups | SSS |
Tremolo | Vintage |
incl. Bag | No |
incl. Case | No |
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The body is made up of three pieces of wood and is very light. However, it is surprisingly resonant. On mine, the grain and width of the two outer sections match perfectly. The centre section has a very straight and contrasting fine grain. As I have varnished the body using rub on thinned varnish after hand sanding all over with 400 and 600 sandpaper, the grain shows through and looks good. The result is an ?aged, natural? look, which is precisely what I was looking for. So for me, it is very pleasing aesthetically.
The neck is a perfect and very tight fit into the body pocket. It is an even better fit than the two other Harley Benton kits I have built (Single Cut and TL) and I was very pleased with both of those. The rosewood finger board is smooth and blemish free. The frets are very level for the price range. Only one fret (4th) being slightly high. A quick sand and polish sorted out the problem. The slots in the nut all wanted additional filing to lower the strings for good action and ensure intonation. The groove positioning was perfect. This extra work has resulted in a good low action and enabled me to set the guitar up to Fender strat specifications. Remember you have to shape the head stock yourself. I used a router to cut a strat style shape without a problem. The back of the neck finish is very smooth and only has a light matt varnish. Left as it is, which I have done, it is a perfect smooth playing action. I would question how long the varnish will last though, before sanding and refinishing is necessary. All in all the neck is very good and well worth a little time and effort to get perfect.
As far as the pre-drilled holes go, only the low E tuner retaining screw was slightly out of place. All the others were okay, so no serious complaint, but as it was out by approximately a screw width, I had to plug the original hole and re-drill, as I was concerned the screw may not grip if I just left it.
The scratch plate needed slight sanding on the low E side of the neck in order to get a good fit. It does look good with the gold lettering on the volume/tone controls. The electrics worked well. The pickups are bright, but not very powerful. Setting up as close to the strings as specs allow is recommended. However I found the overall tone to be as good as a Squier, so at this price range, no complaints. To suit my personal taste, the neck pickup could be warmer, but this is personal and not everyone may agree.
The tremolo fitted well, but in my opinion could do with a larger block which would most likely improve sustain. Once again at this price range, perfectly acceptable.
The strings need to be replaced. After using them for setting up, I changed them for D?addario 9 ? 42?s. This made a vast improvement to tone. Definitely change the strings!
Without tweaking, this guitar is better than the cheap range Strat copies, which are twice the price. The neck is worth putting in a little extra effort as the overall quality is very good and if you put the effort in, the result is a guitar equally as good as a Squier.
I am very pleased with this guitar and apart from the fun/pleasure derived from building it, the resulting guitar is very playable. Even if you were unlucky enough to have more issues than I did, Thomann after sales service is the best I have experienced of any musical instrument supplier, so you do not have to worry. Delivery was incredible, equally as quick, if not quicker than some UK suppliers. If you are considering a kit guitar, I would recommend buying one of these without hesitation.
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After seeing videos on YouTube and varying quality (it appears the T-style kits are the best by far, which will be my next purchase), I was pleasantly surprised by the entire kit.
Firstly the body. Smooth and well cut, it could have been left as is but the sealant had to go so I could prime it for painting. Sanding by hand using 120, 400, and 600 grit sandpaper as I went, the sealant varied from very little along the back and front to seemingly truckloads along the belly cut. Still, when I couldn’t get anymore out, it didn’t look too different and I couldn’t see any defects. Although the painting process would reveal some anyway (sanding and spraying over the two sections along the back resolved that).
The neck feels extremely smooth and shaping the headstock didn’t take long (cutting by hand with a Japanese saw). The frets felt smooth enough out of the box that only an absolute perfectionist would be sanding and polishing them. More importantly, they’re also level. Which happily saved me some work! 🙂
The pickups are decent ceramic ones without much in the way of breakup at the extreme ends. Functional and certainly on a par with guitars that use ceramic pickups from any brand that cost upwards of £200 (depending on how cheeky the brand is). If you want Alnico pickups, either buy a prebuilt Harley Benton (from £110+), a Kramer VS-211 (£109+), or buy a set of Alnico pickups either to immediately replace or later on down the line (set aside £20-£30).
The tuners are much the same as any inexpensive electric guitar. They work and, with the guitar setup properly, stay in tune. Although locking tuners would be advised at some point.
The same can be said for the strings, good enough for setup but I replaced them with a set of 9s I had laying around (budget Johnny Brook brand but they sound better to me).
The real joy though is having a guitar that you painted and put together without any need for soldering. Straight out of the box, you could have this all put together in about an hour or so — although if you’re going to be painting this, obviously expect to add days to the build time to allow for adequate drying time as you build up the layers. Paint and lacquer (or clear coat if you go with that instead), expect to set aside around £15 or monetary equivalent for primer, main colour, and lacquer. Of course. if you have unused paint/varnish laying about.
Overall, I’d say if you’re willing to budget about £50 extra to cover any tooling and materials you’ll need, you’ll have a perfectly playable guitar that will not look like any other and, provided you can play well enough, will impress all around you. Expect to tell the story of your kit build many times over! I built this for my sister for her to learn to play guitar on. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if I get requests.
I give this kit 4/5 overall — but the enjoyment I derived from the entire project means it gets top marks 5/5 from me!
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Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit Single Cut
Electric Guitar Kit SC-Style
- Complete DIY (do it yourself) kit
- Neck attachment: Bolt-on
- Body: Rengas (wood colour may vary)
- Top: Arched
- Neck: Maple
- Fretboard: Amaranth
- Fretboard inlays: Trapezoid
- Double action truss rod
- 22 Frets
- Scale: 628 mm
- Nut width: 42 mm
- Truss rod
- Pickups: 2 Humbuckers
- Controls: 2 Volume, 2 Tone
- 3-Way switch
- Hardware: Chrome
- Machine heads: Diecast
- Strings: .009 — .042
- Finish: Natural
Note: A certain degree of skill in handiwork is required for successful assembly of the guitar.
Audio Examples
Further Information
Colour | Natural |
---|---|
Body | Solid Wood |
Top | None |
Neck | Maple |
Fretboard | Amaranth |
Frets | 22 |
Scale | 628 mm |
Pickups | HH |
Tremolo | None |
Incl. Case | No |
Incl. Gigbag | No |
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I purchased this kit, as I wanted an LP style guitar for the tone produced for recording some backing tracks, but had a limited budget. The result really surprised me. The veneer on the body is thin, so use minimum pressure when sanding. The finish is amazing. I am into natural finishes and so after a light sanding, just used thin clear varnish applied with a cloth. The result is quite stunning. A natural butterscotch with a light catching grain. It literally reflects light on stage in places.
The electrics are wrong. If left unchanged, the tone pots do not work. Five minutes with a soldering iron chnging one wire on each tone pot to the correct lug cured the problem. The cure is detailed on several reviews, so I won’t bore you with repeating it hear. Once done, the volume and tone controls work very well indeed.
The back of the neck, I left as it came. The fine smooth varnish finish is perfect to play.
The only other problem was the nut. It came with the high E slot cut too near the edge. A replacement for under 2 euros cured the problem and allowed me to file it to the ideal depth.
The Frets were surpisingly good. After fitting the new nut, I set the neck to Gibson Les Paul specs and it plays perfectly. No buzz, surpringly low action. Can’t ask for more.
The pickups are very acceptable, producing the rich creamy sound I was specifically after on the neck pickup, with the tone pot turned fairly down and very capable of the typical LP scream on teh bridge pick up if required. Sustain is amazing. In my opinion, a far superior performer to the Vintage/Revelation LP copies that cost 3 times the price.
The bridge is an obvious copy. Typical of a Chinese ebay replacement. I was lucky with mine, it works and I have left it on.
If I add the price of the nut and a set of D’addario 10’s strings to replace the ones that came with it. I got the bargain of the century for under 100 Euros. I have played live, recorded 7 songs with this guitar and a professional performer (an ex-guitarist from Mott The Hoople) asked me if it was for sale. It isn’t!
The wiring, bridge and the nut brought the quality rating down to Okay for the price. The rest is good.
So in short, if you want a good LP copy and are willing to spend 5 minutes resoldering, maybe a new nut and reasonable time setting up the neck carefully. go for it, you will not be disappointed. I reckon I would have to pay at least £500 to buy a ready made of equal playability. In fact, it has turned out to be a far superior performer to the Gibson Studio.
I have been as honest and detailed as I can. I hope this helps you.
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i bought this kit several years ago, and intended to delay the review as i wanted to see if this guitar can stand the test of time, and frequent use. so i indeed bought one, and then assembled it, and kept it in its default configuration, including the finish, since after assembly. played the guitar for years on a daily basis for hours.
okay, fast forward three years, and here’s what’s happened to it.
1. the frets wore out. i had to refret it using harder frets.
2. the neck bowed a bit. i was rather baffled by this because i was only using standard 10-46’s. it was made more evident when i used 10-52’s. so i adjusted the truss rod while there was tension on the strings, and that fixed it, but then it had a bit of back bow with the strings removed. i just surmised that probably the neck was too soft.
3. the pickups sounded muddier. this was, more or less, a perception issue, and only got resolved when i replaced them with stock epiphone pickups that i had on hand. not to say that the stock pickups were bad, but for me, i felt that they weren’t good either.
4. bridge saddles wore out fairly quick. this must’ve been caused by my hands as they keep rubbing with the saddles as i do my palm muting. i swapped the entire bridge with an aftermarket roller bridge, and bought a harley benton tailpiece to complement it.
5. pots started becoming scratchy after a few months. since they became so, i chose to buy log pots and replaced the linear ones installed in the kit. i recycled the stock capacitor, but i also intend to replace that down the line.
6. stock tuners went all over the place. you can’t make the guitar stay in tune for too long with the stock tuners. there were also dead spots when turning the pegs, and that greatly affected the tuning. i replaced them with an old set of taylor tuners that i had on hand, and that worked wonders on the tuning.
three years on, the guitar is still working, and is still in its default unfinished state. i’ve never laid any paint or refreshed the sealer on the wood, as i liked how it looked as a barely finished guitar. my hope is to see it work for more years to come, hopefully outliving me too.
to sum it up, it’s a very good starter kit for those who want to learn how to build, play and maintain guitars. for those seeking something more robust or something that requires less maintenance, then this might not be for you.
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Harley Benton SC Guitar Kit.
This kit was purchased to review the quality, fit and finish of the Thomann HB kits, then to use the kit as a platform for and extreme modification project.
The kit arrived a few months ago, and has now been opened, reviewed and initial assembly completed.
Please keep in mind, this is a ± $92 US, guitar KIT, it is not a finished guitar and likely has a different QC process than does a finished guitar.
A few examples of QC would be attention to the fret ends, the fit of the neck plate, potential electronic wiring issues, and some discrepancies in the parts bags.
NECK & BODY:
In general, the body and neck are very well made for a «semi-raw» wood kit. The body has an initial sealer coating applied, it is a clear coating only to control the wood fibers slightly. It is not a filler, nor level coating, just a sealer of some sort.
The neck is coated with a satin finish, but is far more refined than the body. The neck could be used as delivered on a completed guitar. The body is rather rough, and should be refined through sanding and other sealer and finish methods.
The dual-action truss rod works well.
FRETBOARD & FRETS:
The fretboard and inlays look good and well manufactured, however it appears a final sanding set was skipped. The fretboard has a slight coarseness to the feel, like the final sanding was done with 100 grit material. The frets are reasonably well set, and this is the first HB guitar that I have seen some sort of glue used with the frets. The fret ends should be addressed before doing any assembly work on this kit, as the guitar I received will slice your hands to pieces. The jagged fret ends are everywhere, nearly every fret. The fret wire will also need to be cleaned, and polished. There is some fine gritty coating on the wire, with fretted notes or bends this coating, or film, will be evident.
When the frets are leveled, crowned and polished this issue will be moot.
TUNERS:
These are rather low quality items. The only reason I say this is because at least one of the 6 in my kit are bad. In general the others function well, there is some slop in the string post, but otherwise the tuning button shaft works well, except for that 1 tuner. The one bad tuner is bound up and will barely turn. I will be replacing the entire set of tuners.
PICKUPS:
The pickups are wax potted, and marked N, for neck, and B for bridge.
Both pickups have single, two wire leads which include the plug ends. The Neck pickup has a «white» sheathed lead, and the Bridge has a «black sheathed lead (on my kit). The Electronics have matching coloring — so it should go together intuitively — It should.
ELECTRONICS:
The supplied switch has a good positive feel and is prepped with Plug-n-play connectors. Of course the plug-n-play feature fails as the kit can easily be connected incorrectly. So, some shuffling of connectors may be required. This kit is likely intended for someone who may not have soldering equipment, and the presumed «ease» of plugging components together will likely help sales. I expect some purchasers to experience frustration if they connect the switch leads in the wrong pairing — they may get NO sound…
The pots volume and tone all function as they should, and once I swapped a couple connectors all components worked properly.
The wiring feeds easily threw the routed passages in the body. There is ample wire length on each component. In fact, there is almost too much wire included.
BRIDGE & STOP TAIL:
These are typical low cost TOM style bridge components. The quality is average, and some «repair» may be needed on the bridge. My bridge had an issue with the retainer springs that hold the saddle screws in place. 2 of the 4 springs needed to be removed, slightly bent to improve tension, and reassembled. Not a big deal, but the bridge would be a serious issue without this adjustment/repair.
This is not the first HB TOM bridge that I’ve had to adjust in this way, it seems to be a rather typical issue, but easily resolved.
VARIOUS HARDWARE & COMPONENTS:
As the kit comes, there are a few little bags containing all the bits and pieces. You should do an inventory of all the screws, washers and parts that you receive in the kit before beginning assembly. My kit arrived a couple washers short, but has a few extra trim screws.
FLAW:
Even for a $92 US kit, the biggest flaw I can’t overlook is the poor fit of the neck mounting plate. At a glance it looks nice and appears to be contoured to match the cut of the body, but that is NOT the case.
It seems like it is the wrong neck plate for this guitar. The holes all align with the body and neck, the screws all seat properly, but the end of the plate doesn’t follow the body shape. The neck plate protrudes beyond the body contour slightly, but obviously wrong.
Perhaps Thomann/Harley Benton changed a template at one time and this was overlooked, or the Mfg just shipped the wrong part, I don’t know.
It works, but looks — wrong.
TAKEAWAY:
The overall collection of «parts» is pretty good, there are some flaws in the bits and pieces, but this is an affordable/ cheap kit. It is honestly better than any kit I’ve worked on at slightly higher prices. So, I have to give Thomann and HB credit for a good attempt, it’s almost right.
This may not be a great kit for someone with NO tools or troubleshooting ability, but it can be turned into a decent guitar. It will just take some work.
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