A
The Great, Good, Bad & Ugly
GREAT
The biggest surprise on this guitar is how good the pickups sound. I've previously used Seymour Duncan, Dimazio, Kent Armstrong etc as well as countless OEM rubbish and these Wilkinsons are of Seymour Duncan quality. Proper alnico slugs, quiet, nicely bright and clear but with a dark poke when needed. Hank Marvin to Yngwie at the flick of a dirt pedal. No need to upgrade!
The Trem is also a quality Wilkinson unit with a HUGE inertia block. Very solid sound, returns to pitch every time (once I'd set it up, see below). Wish the grub screws had smoother tops, though!
The body is solid basswood as advertised, not plywood as is common at entry-level price. Well finished with high quality routing that fit the pickups snuggly - i.e. no horrible 'swimming pool' gap under the pickguard! Rosewood laminate looks great in the flesh and the headstock is immaculate.
GOOD
The tuners work and look ok. Electrics are all 250k pots, no noise and smooth travel. Tone pots are the usual exponential taper so only really work over a small part of their travel, which is normal but could be upgraded. Neck is a chunky thick-ish D profile with big frets. Didn't hold its tuning AT ALL at first, but settled down once I stretched the brand new strings.
Action as supplied was stupidly high, brought it down (using supplied tools) to almost fret-level and there's no buzz at all. Very impressive.
BAD
Action as supplied is absurdly high (as above), trem screwed back tight against the body. Easy enough to adjust it all so it plays beautifully, though, so I've this is your first guitar then look on YouTube on how to do basic setups to get the best out of it. Fret board was dry and some ugly dye spillage was visible. I removed the strings and rubbed it down lightly, then applied Lemon Oil for a smoother, uniform appearance. Still has the 'open' texture of rosewood but no longer feels like I'm playing on a stick I just picked up in a forest.
UGLY
Frets had slightly sharp ends in the upper octave, I fixed it with a small file, didn't take much work. Worse is that the frets don't feel like they've been crowned completely, leaving a very 'scratchy' feel when bending strings. I don't have a crowning file so I'm going to play it for a few months to see if it fixes itself. Real shame, but not a deal breaker.
Whereas the hardware is mostly of decent quality, the jackplate has some bubbling on the chrome plating - yuk!
SUMMING UP
The high quality of the pickups, trem and body/neck materials mean that this guitar sound amazing - easily as good as Mex Fenders costing several times the asking price.
The poor finish to the frets is a disappointment and, initially, makes it feel like the entry-level guitar it is. With an hours work, however, it's starting to play and feel much more like a decent instrument.
It's now hanging on my wall between a Gibson Les Paul and a high-end Ibanez and its currently my guitar of choice, just because it sounds EXACTLY like a great Strat should sound. I don't care about the name on the headstock.
Upgrade-wise: I might get a Teflon-type nut and some roller string trees to help with the tuning (ok as is, but I like using the trem). I'll replace the tone controls with a master tone pot using a spare Fender Delta Tone I've got laying around, just to open them out a bit. Maybe add an active boost on the other pot. And I've already replaced the big chrome scratchplate screws with small-head black ones, just to make it look that tiny bit more badass. And I need to change that crappy bubbled jackplate for a black one.
I'm probably being hard on a £125 guitar here - it sounds like a £600 guitar and soon it'll play like one!
The biggest surprise on this guitar is how good the pickups sound. I've previously used Seymour Duncan, Dimazio, Kent Armstrong etc as well as countless OEM rubbish and these Wilkinsons are of Seymour Duncan quality. Proper alnico slugs, quiet, nicely bright and clear but with a dark poke when needed. Hank Marvin to Yngwie at the flick of a dirt pedal. No need to upgrade!
The Trem is also a quality Wilkinson unit with a HUGE inertia block. Very solid sound, returns to pitch every time (once I'd set it up, see below). Wish the grub screws had smoother tops, though!
The body is solid basswood as advertised, not plywood as is common at entry-level price. Well finished with high quality routing that fit the pickups snuggly - i.e. no horrible 'swimming pool' gap under the pickguard! Rosewood laminate looks great in the flesh and the headstock is immaculate.
GOOD
The tuners work and look ok. Electrics are all 250k pots, no noise and smooth travel. Tone pots are the usual exponential taper so only really work over a small part of their travel, which is normal but could be upgraded. Neck is a chunky thick-ish D profile with big frets. Didn't hold its tuning AT ALL at first, but settled down once I stretched the brand new strings.
Action as supplied was stupidly high, brought it down (using supplied tools) to almost fret-level and there's no buzz at all. Very impressive.
BAD
Action as supplied is absurdly high (as above), trem screwed back tight against the body. Easy enough to adjust it all so it plays beautifully, though, so I've this is your first guitar then look on YouTube on how to do basic setups to get the best out of it. Fret board was dry and some ugly dye spillage was visible. I removed the strings and rubbed it down lightly, then applied Lemon Oil for a smoother, uniform appearance. Still has the 'open' texture of rosewood but no longer feels like I'm playing on a stick I just picked up in a forest.
UGLY
Frets had slightly sharp ends in the upper octave, I fixed it with a small file, didn't take much work. Worse is that the frets don't feel like they've been crowned completely, leaving a very 'scratchy' feel when bending strings. I don't have a crowning file so I'm going to play it for a few months to see if it fixes itself. Real shame, but not a deal breaker.
Whereas the hardware is mostly of decent quality, the jackplate has some bubbling on the chrome plating - yuk!
SUMMING UP
The high quality of the pickups, trem and body/neck materials mean that this guitar sound amazing - easily as good as Mex Fenders costing several times the asking price.
The poor finish to the frets is a disappointment and, initially, makes it feel like the entry-level guitar it is. With an hours work, however, it's starting to play and feel much more like a decent instrument.
It's now hanging on my wall between a Gibson Les Paul and a high-end Ibanez and its currently my guitar of choice, just because it sounds EXACTLY like a great Strat should sound. I don't care about the name on the headstock.
Upgrade-wise: I might get a Teflon-type nut and some roller string trees to help with the tuning (ok as is, but I like using the trem). I'll replace the tone controls with a master tone pot using a spare Fender Delta Tone I've got laying around, just to open them out a bit. Maybe add an active boost on the other pot. And I've already replaced the big chrome scratchplate screws with small-head black ones, just to make it look that tiny bit more badass. And I need to change that crappy bubbled jackplate for a black one.
I'm probably being hard on a £125 guitar here - it sounds like a £600 guitar and soon it'll play like one!
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i
Great little guitar for anyone wanting that 'ST' sound
I have a number of styles of guitar but was missing a standard ST style guitar (S-S-S pick-ups). I looked at the options and decided to take a punt on this guitar as I figured it couldn't hurt as it could be a good modding platform if it needed work.
It arrived quickly (to the UK) and was well pacakaged as usual. Thanks!
Right out of the box is was giving me the tones that my existing options were missing and to top it off was very comfortable to play. It gives all the ST options I wanted (e.g. quack, bite etc) and slotted very neatly into my collection.
It is a strange thing comparing guitars as they all sound different and perform differently in varying situations - so there is no way to directly compare them... but I feel no lack in quality or tone if I pick this up after using my F-tele, F-mustang, Gib-335 or Gret-Pro Jet.
I definitely recommend this guitar unless you feel you HAVE to have the correct shape headstock and name.
It arrived quickly (to the UK) and was well pacakaged as usual. Thanks!
Right out of the box is was giving me the tones that my existing options were missing and to top it off was very comfortable to play. It gives all the ST options I wanted (e.g. quack, bite etc) and slotted very neatly into my collection.
It is a strange thing comparing guitars as they all sound different and perform differently in varying situations - so there is no way to directly compare them... but I feel no lack in quality or tone if I pick this up after using my F-tele, F-mustang, Gib-335 or Gret-Pro Jet.
I definitely recommend this guitar unless you feel you HAVE to have the correct shape headstock and name.
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F
amazing price/value ratio! very happy!
I am a metal guy, I have decided to learn blues and I wanted a cheap but nice guitar next to my seven string. I was happy to see this guitar from the Deluxe series and it did not dissapointed me. Really great single coils, surpised how different sounds you can get of coil splits. The finish is very nice, fret ands are not sharp, not cutting (as I have read on some other Harley Benton reviews), tuners are holding great, not de-tuned after a week of not using the guitar. Tremolo could be better, but thats due the .10 string set is too thick, IMHO. Probably a .09 set would fit the guitar better. Anyhow, I can recommend this instrument for anybody for a single coil strat guitar!
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D
Quality strat
Looks to die for on this guitar, plays a dream straight out of the box, nice tone. Love the slightly wider than squire neck on this model. Only fault was when I removed the plastic off the scratch plate it was covered in light scratches & I'm now going to replace with a tortoiseshell one. That's just me being picky, looks don't normally bother me but this is eyecandy & I'll try & keep it's looks, I'v got plenty of relics so nice to have a good looker as well as a really good playing guitar. I would have given 5 stars but for the scratch plate. Nice one Thomman, highly recommended.
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MC
Good looking and good sound
Needed little setup, throstrod adjusted, action little high and looking to replace nut with tusq do or something like that( just need to measure it correctly:).
Very happy with my purchase and this was my second Harley Benton and third one has made it's way home also so loving this brand :)
One weird thing, very light guitar, like extremely light, not sure if it is a sign of anything...
It has been nearly a year since I bought it and only thing that needed adjustments was the neck, which is easy (1/4 turn right and straight as it should be) with the supplied tool.
Recommended
Very happy with my purchase and this was my second Harley Benton and third one has made it's way home also so loving this brand :)
One weird thing, very light guitar, like extremely light, not sure if it is a sign of anything...
It has been nearly a year since I bought it and only thing that needed adjustments was the neck, which is easy (1/4 turn right and straight as it should be) with the supplied tool.
Recommended
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