Harley Benton CST-24T Paradise Flame Reviews

Fantastic guitar; I can't play anything else

For the price, the CST-24T is simply amazing. The design is astonishing; the curved, deep red/orange body is eye catching. Bear in mind this is a 24 fret guitar; the neck is longer than on a typical strat/tele.

I made the following mods to my guitar:

Replaced the telecaster-style volume knobs with Harley Benton SC-Style Speeedknob AM's. These are smaller, rounder, flat red speedknobs, that really suit the guitar better.

I used fine grade steel wool and sandpaper to remove the topmost layer of gloss on the guitar neck. I did not sand down to the wood, but instead reduced the high-gloss, stick neck plastic to a much smoother, matte finish. This was a vast improvement, as I prefer matte necks to glossy.

My complaints:

The pickups are not perfect; they are quite loud in dual configuration, but produce little tonal variety.

The volume pot is exponential, not linear, so only the last 30% makes any difference to output volume.

The tone knob makes almost no difference.

In short, the materials and craftsmanship of the 24T are perfect, and only the (easily upgradeable) electronics occasionally detract from my playing.

Overall : 9 out of 10

Amazing

Amazing instrument for the price you pay. If you replace the tuners, you have a very good guitar.

Finish is amazing, but you may find a few mistakes in the design.

Best guitar for price, EVER

Guitar seems to be a PRS copy, i watched some videos on the youtube before i decided to buy this guitar. Today i ordered another 2 Harley Benton guitars.

Pros:

- good quality paint

- good shape, no sharp edges or loss in the guitar body

- good sustain, no quiet notes on the fretboard

- good setup guitar from the stock, just open and play no need additional intonation settings or other strings actions

Cons

- really dry fingerboard, i have to use oli for polishing it

- sharp edges on the frets

Bad guitar

Their is no way to tune the guitar. From the first to the last frets their is no way to tune this the guitar. Also the electronic and tone control don't work on it. It is a very poor quality. The bridge is not good. It is not a fine tune guitar.

Amazing

Recieved this guitar in 3 days of ordering from Germany,i live in UK. Could not believe the quality of this item.Action was a little high but soon rectified.I have owned a lot of guitars over the last 50 years but this comes in the top 3.Excellent axe,excellent service.Very pleased.

very suprised

great guitar, and very fun to play.gigged out with it and everybody was asking where I got them. if your thinking about it pull the trigger

Beautiful but not without issues.

Out of the box the guitar looked stunning but the bridge saddles looked to be in a very high. I did expect to have to set this guitar up so I wasn't too perturbed. No sharp fret ends, the body is a single piece of mahogany which I was very surprised about, I was expecting 2 or 3 pieces glues together, so a pleasant surprise.

The setup is where the issues arose. The truss rod was loose so the neck had a good bow on it and the action was sky high and fret buzz and choking was a rendering the guitar unplayable as it was. I tightened the truss rod which improved things across the neck but there's still a light buzz. There is some uneveness with the frets which will need to be addressed at some point. I think there may be a slight dip in the neck where the truss rod ends, but the neck will probably take a couple of days to settle given the state that it was in when it arrived.

But on to the main issue with this guitar, and that's the bridge. The saddles need to be raised so high that they are well proud of the trem body, this not only looks strange it is extremely uncomfortable to play as the saddles are square with a sharp corner, it's actually unplayable. I think filing the corner off the low E saddle would help a lot, or swap them for rounded saddles or replace the bridge. Maybe the neck on my one is glued at a bad angle, but in the stock photos you can see the saddle height is high also (not as high as on my one). If I was buying this again I'd get the fixed bridge version.

The pickups sound OK, but I'll probably replace them if I get the neck/frets and bridge sorted so that the guitar is nice to play.

Update:

I've now leveled and dressed the frets and filed the corner of the E saddle so the corner is blunt. After a couple of months playing it I'm astonished every time I pick it up how nice it is to play. It is super comfortable. I have a 1980's RG550 that I've owned since new and love to bits, but I find myself picking up the Harley Benton and leaving the Ibanez sitting in its stand. My reservations about the trem are now redundant. The neck has settled beautifully, it looks great and plays great. If you know how to level and dress frets or are willing to pay the £80 or so for someone to do it get one of these. Out of the box it was terrible, but once the issues are sorted it's outstanding. The fretboard does feel a bit weird/dry though, but I suspect once my finger oil/dirt embeds itself in it it will improve.

Again Amazing guitar

Cant fault it at all. Love these Harley Benton Guitars. fret board oil is a must though, After that plays like a dream.

Amazing guitar

It came already setup. Nice pickups and tremolo stays in tune well. Huge tone block on the trem. Great guitar and an amazing value.

What a beautiful and comfortable guitar!!!

This beauty looks really close to the original!

Well-built, balanced, with a very comfortable neck and low action right out of the box. Great fret job.

Looks stunning, with a beautiful flame maple top (it's not very thick though) and luscious curves. Fretboard looks like rosewood, rather than fake ebony (which is better actually)! Tuners and tremolo, both work just fine. Pickups sound pretty good, just not mind-blowing (that's why a give 4 stars to sound).

There are only a few minor cosmetic flaws to the finish (that's why 4 stars to quality). Other than that, superb!!!

I'm pretty happy with my purchase. She worths every penny...!

Buy this guitar...

This is the third Harley Banton guitar I have purchased in a month and id the best of the bunch. Not sure if I was very lucky but out of the box the guitar was perfect.

I could not find a single fault with the finish. The action was spot on, nice and low with zero fret buzz .Intonation perfect and it was even in tune. A beautiful guitar to look at and very easy to play with a great neck profile not far off from my USA custom 24. If I had paid £500-£600 pounds I would still be impressed with this gem. In my opinion it is as good , probably better than the SE version this guitar is based on.

Pickups much better than I expected but I may change them in the future simply as I have several sets lying around. I have no reservations reccommending this guitar it brilliant for the price.

Now what one shall I buy next ?

Beautiful Guitar

I have had a number of guitars from the Harley Benton range and all have been very good.

Most need a good set up and some may need fret dressing,levelling,truss rod adjustment and polishing.

Normal for a budget guitar.

The CST 24T needed only the action adjusted for my own preference.

It is a stunning looking guitar that players beautifully the black finger board plays very well.

For the price a complete bargain.

Highly recommended only thought though a coil tap and different control knobs would be the finishing touch.

May well do it at a latter date when I can stop playing it.

Regards

AndyU

Stunner

I confess I really ordered this guitar because of the looks. I've always preferred the sound of strats to the heavier mahogany sounds so I didn't expect to be playing this much - just sitting admiring it!

Well, when it arrived the looks certainly didn't disappoint; front back and sides all look superb and finished really nicely. The only quibble I had was with the fretboard which was rosewood when I ordered it, but the spec had changed to ebonol when it was sent. There's plenty of opinion to be found on the internet re ebonol; the general agreement is that it is a good material for fretboards and looks very much like ebony, if that's your thing. The guitar still looks amazing, but personally I would have preferred rosewood.

So next step was to try out the playability. The action was excellent; the nut probably a shade high as is normal with new guitars, but generally it felt really good. A bit of buzzing around the 15th fret but nothing too serious, and easily fixed. I wasn't used to the neck shape but it felt comfortable enough.

Plugging it in was a revelation! Yes, a darker sound than Fender, but the simple controls give a wide range of sounds. And when you add a bit of overdrive, reverb etc. it really sings. I've now had it a couple of weeks and it has quickly become my guitar of choice.

For the price? ............ ridiculously good value. I'm very, very happy.

Just Great

It sounds very good (but I'm not usually a guitar player so don't trust me that much on that). The quality of the hardware and the finish is great. Definitely much more than I was expecting for something on that price range.