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Ouch
Until last week, I'd only ever owned two guitars - cheap strat copy bought when I was about 16 (so '89ish) which is still at my dad's house and an Epiphone SG400 bought in about 1998 which I still play (really badly)
Last week I got my first acoustic. It was inexpensive but I really like how it sounds 🙂
Well I'm not sure whether to thank Mr Drummer or curse him. I'd never heard of Harley Benton, and this thread (and the lockdown) got me picking up my old acoustic and getting into the Justin Guitar thing. I'd had a couple of nice guitars in the past, a Tokai strat and a MIJ Fender '57 copy Tele.
Yesterday I ordered a staggeringly beautiful beast from Harley Benton for less than £200. A PRS copy CRS-24T in black flame with P90s.
Until it arrives I'm holding myself back with the mantra "if something looks too good to be true it probably is" going round in my head. But the reviews are great, I can send it back for free if it's not right but if it is I'll share some pictures on here.
From my limited experience Harley Benton really are nice guitars, for a fraction of the price you’d pay for an ‘original’ - I have two, after all
I found an Epiphone G-400 Vintage at Dawson’s Music for £239.
The HB double cut guitar looks very nice but seems in fact to be a copy of a copy - it’s more like the ESP Viper than a true SG.
So I ordered the Epiphone (a Gibson brand, sometimes found to be better quality than Gibson themselves!) copy of the Gibson original. 2-3 working days, it said...
I’m now looking at the £80 Harley Benton Tele!
Roughly autobiographically, it’s now something like: 1981 Aria Pro2 double cutaway thing,
ooooh - Matsumoko Aria 🙂
I've been looking at the HB electrics, can't really justify one but seems like a good time to expand on my 3 chords and a new/electric guitar might inspire me to make more of an effort.
I've bought two Harley Benton T-types. The first 79e I bought for parts and it was so good I coudln't bring myself to break it. So good I fitted nice pickups, an ashtray bridge and a Graphtec nut. One of my best guitars, the neck is better finished than one of my Mexican necks!
So I bought another for parts and paid a bit more, 120e IIRC. Fortunately I didn't buy it for the neck which is awful compared with the 79e example requiring a lot of work with files and and a small polishing mop to make it useable. The machine heads are sloppy, the electrics poor. The body, bridge and Wilkinson pickups are fine but it was a disappointment because the cheaper one was so much better.
I keep getting internet ads following me around for the Harley Benton double cutaway Les Paul Junior... which is dangerously close to 'A couple of beers on payday' impulse purchase money... I had a Japanese Edwards LP Jr in TV Yellow and it was lovely and I regret selling it. I do have a homemade Cabronita single pickup job if I need that single pickup joy, so I'll have to resist a little longer.
However, er, I do appear to have another guitar inbound - a black and white '50s Strat in the style Eric Johnson's black Strat...
Please visit my 'Guitars for sale' post on the Classifieds. Much must go to make room for this one... 🙂
I've got the guitars down to around 7. Its the FX that get to me. Just bought a TC Plethora X5.
I do like TC stuff.
I ordered a Harley Benton last Monday, it arrived on Friday and I just can't find anything wrong with it. OK I had to get a hacksaw blade to deepen the low E and G slots in the nut but that's it. I changed the strings to 9s and no adjustment needed. The tall frets mean I need to stop pressing down so much on the E string when I play a G chord, as it makes it a little sharp
Schwiiiing!!!
Very PRStastic and P90s too.
Is it routed for a trem or is that locked flush to the top?
I have succumbed and have this arriving later in the week. It's the guitar that I always wanted as a 18 year old (or more accuratately the Charvel Jackson equivalent of this). Can't wait.
Yes, there's a trem. Seems to stay in tune OK. I wouldn't want not to have one as so many of the guitarists I admire make good use of them.
Pretty good for £195 delivered - and if I didn't like it 14 days free no-quibble return to Germany.
The tall frets mean I need to stop pressing down so much on the E string when I play a G chord, as it makes it a little sharp
When I mentioned the poor neck on the more expensive Thomann Tele I bought one of the faults was an incorrectly placed nut. The measurement nut to first fret was too long which meant that everything was a bit sharp and pressing down even slightly accentuated that to the point it was annoyingly audible. The answer was to buy a thicker nut and open up the nut slot thus moving the nut.
Check yours:
The first two tables are from Stew Mac and correct. The third table is an example of a guitar with the nut badly placed.
https://www.stewmac.com/FretCalculator.html
Bugger. Dawson’s Music have gone into administration so I might not be getting that SG after all 🙁 will have to get the credit card company onto that.
So in the meantime I ordered a Squier Bullet Telecaster for the whopping price of £135. That’s two weeks worth of diesel if I wasn’t working from home. It arrived next day, from Gear4music.
And guess what? it’s the nicest guitar to play of the lot of them!
https://shop.fender.com/en-GB/bullet-telecaster/0370045506.html
Back to Thomann for the Harley Benton SG / ESP Viper copy when it comes back into stock
Thanks Edukator, I'll check that.