TE-52 NA Vintage Series : This one made me sell 2 of my Fender Telecasters

I bought this guitar after hearing so much about Harley Benton guitars. It seemed like all the reviews were almost too god to be true so I had to check it out myself and ordered a Harley Benton TE-52 NA Vintage. My rating of this guitar is done considering the overall quality of the guitar related to the cost of it (value for the money).

My first impression unboxing the Harley Benton TE-52 NA Vintage was very good. I started by lifting it out of the box and noticed it is quite heavy to be a tele style guitar. I did not check the weight of the guitar on a scale, but compared with Fender Teles in my hands this one is quite a bit heavier.

The neck of this guitar is pretty thick with a c profile. I love the guitar necks of the 50's (baseball bats) and I will say that this one is close to that size. The neck is actually very similar to the Fender Baja Telecaster. The neck has a satin finish that makes it less sticky and it just feels great in my hands. The finish of this guitar was really perfect and in my opinion the natural looks better than Fenders butterscotch blonde. It was set up perfect right out of the box so I tuned it and plugged it in.

The sound of this one really impressed me. I have always liked the tele sound and this one give me a even more twangy sound than my other t-style guitars. I usually play this guitar with a clean tube amp and various effects from a Boss ME-80. I am able to dial in all the different sounds I want that way. I love the sounds I can get from this guitar both clean and with effects. After a few weeks I noticed that the output jack was coming loose. I just tightened the nut on it and after that it has been fine. The guitar plays really great and even unplugged this one really sings.

Pros:

Perfect finish

Great playability and sounds

Satin neck

Great sustain and sounds good even unplugged

Actually everything

Cons:

A bit heavy for a T-style guitar.

Loose output jack, but it takes 2 minutes to fix it.

As a wrap up I will say that this guitar is really fantastic. I Had to make some choices a few months ago because of lack of space for more guitars. I decided to keep my american teles, but among the 3 non american I would keep one. The guitars were the Harley Benton TE-52, a Fender Baja Telecaster and a Fender Player Telecaster. I spent several hours over 2 week period and the first one to be sold was the Fender Player. After lots of head to head testing and even recording of the Baja and the TE-52. I ended up keeping the Harley Benton TE-52. This Harley Benton actually made me sell 2 of my Fender Telecasters.

Would I recommend this guitar? Absolutely.

Would I buy it again? YESSSS!