Harley Benton DC-DLX Gotoh Pelham Blue Reviews

Good for the price but needs a setup

First of all, the color is gorgeous, 0 problems with the paint.

But as expected, the setup isn't that good (action is high, frets are not polished, intonation is not good enough, and needs a slight neck adjustment)

Overall a great beginner/backup guitar after a setup from a luthier, would recommend it.

If you want an SG,this is it .

the quality is out of this world,the guitar is amazing. I'm not into tesla's but they are not bad.

It'l Take Some work!

Before I post my encounter, I did reach out to Harley Benton for comment. They were quick to respond but gave me the "Corporate Line" leaving me to log a complaint with little effort on their part.

Having purchased a "Discount" guitar I expect certain things. However there were more than a few issues with this purchase.

The guitar was filthy. Black marks on the body, neck, and was covered in what looked like saw dust. Glue on the fretboard and edges of the frets. Black specks on the tuning keys. The G, B and A strings have rust on them from the nut to the 4th fret. The Tusq nut and string windings had cut material packed in the grooves left from when they cut them.

Lastly, the set up was evil. Almost unplayable. I understand that most guitars will require some tweaking but it should be chordable at a minimum.

Once I restrung it, dressed the frets (very rough), adjusted the neck and bridge, it played well although the electronics are quite weak and the pots don't really kick in until 7. 1 -7, Ehh... (expected).

If you buy anything under $300, I suspect that you will be in for a few hours of bench time by your local luthier. HB is earning a reputation for being quite good but I fail to see how. One or two items I can forgive but this one came with a truckload all of which should have been avoided.

Be sure to search on your favorite video sharing site for the sight and sound review.

This is getting scary!

When you can buy a guitar this good for under $200 it shakes your world! This guitar has the best neck with the most level frets I have ever seen on a guitar and I've bought dozens of guitars in my lifetime! Does Harley Benton Plek it's guitars now??? I have never had a guitar that I could set the action so low with no buzzes from high frets! And they're stainless steel frets that will last forever! I was going to swap the pickups out but these Tesla pickups sound really good and I probably won't. The only slight negative is that the nut is cut WAY too high! But I can see why they don't cut the nut for you, they don't know what action you like. So, to really get a good feel of how good this neck is put a capo on the first fret. This guitar will then blow you away!

Great guitar for hard Rock

Beautiful guitar with excellent hardware. Plays really nicely. The pickups are aggressive and took a lot of amp tweaking to get any sounds I liked. Ended up returning it just because it was too difficult to get sounds that fit my repertoire. Nice guitar for crank it up Rock and Roll.

SG quality

Amazing instrument for a 5th of what you would expect for this quality

Another great guitar - Updated review after several months

4th HB guitar and, not sure if by luck, all have been perfect and this one as well.

Somehow, was expecting a lighter shade of blue. Everything was spot on, coil split is nice feature as well. Good build quality, nothing serious to point out. Frets could need some polishing, but that was it.

Update on earlier review (have now had it a couple of months):

- The blue Pelham colour has grown on me and quite like the gold on blue design - very striking and attracts lots of attention

- Stays in tune perfectly

- The Tesla pickups are fantastic, extremely nice and much better (to my ears) than the Roswell's on other guitars

- The coil-split produces quite usable tones

- If you don't already have an SG, this is a very serious option to consider (it compares favourably, and even beats, other brands that cost much more)

- Unbeatable value for money and has permanent place in my rack

Absolutely Love it

After a fret polish and intonation set up this guitar is amazing . The pickups sound great and prefer them to my SD slash set in my 92 Gibson LP, I find when split they dont lose a lot of volume as most other splittable pickups do. When sitting I find you dont have to stretch as far as with Gibson SG's as the lower contour is closer to the neck , this makes a difference if your switching from a Les Paul . If I payed €1000 for this guitar I would be happy with it. I have a lot of high end guitars and this is as good as any of them , I am so impressed by this guitar.

How do you guys do it?

Have never tried Bentons before. On a bipolar impulse bought 3 different models

TE-62CC

DC-DLX Gotoh

SC-Custom Plus EMG FR

I have no words to describe.. I stay in Malaysia.. Had requested someone from the team to sign said guitars.

The guitars are made in Indonesia.. But were sent from Germany.. They came all signed as requested.. The tele and sg came IN TUNE!! (can you imagine that?) they were setup to perfection.. The floyd I preferred a little lower action (but that's just personal taste)

Finish were all tasteful.. No feet buzz.. I mean seriously.. How do you guys do it?

I own about 20 guitars in total..from fenders to gibsons to ibanez to Tokai and of a few corts.. Some of which are 3 times the price of the most expensive Benton I bought..

I'll go as far to say that the only thing you may need to change (in the future) are the pick ups (you need to do that with all guitars anyway) ..

Everything else is solid as an ox. The Bentons are as good.. And in some cases even better then the guitars they are trying to (copy sounds like a bad word.. Maybe the guitars that were inspired by).

I think anyone who is thinking of buying a cort or squire or epiphone or whatever brand that's sub of the original American counterpart should try a benton.. Trust me.. They will shock you.

Don't even get me started on the price.. Like seriously man.. How do you guys do it.

Nothing else to add.. Continue with the great job, production and admin team. You guys rock!

excellent value with some minor issues

I think this is a great guitar for the money. The binding looks nice, the finish is nearly flawless, the tuners are very responsive with no backlash and the pickups sound nice. It seems to be staying in tune, too. There are no sharp fret ends that cut your hand. Shipping to the US was very fast and very reasonable. Overall, I am very pleased by this purchase. But there are a few issues I want to point out.

First, the action is a bit high for my taste. This normally would not be an issue at all, except that the bridge on the treble side is already at the bottom. That means I cannot lower the action without re-cutting the nut, or installing a new one. Fortunately, only two slots needed to be re-cut.

The fretboard looks like it is painted or dyed. But not very well. There are pores (as is normal in rosewood) where some sort of white paste is embedded. If I could post a picture, I would. While it is not noticeable at a distance, once you see it, it is hard to un-see. It was easy to clean out, though.

Overall, I think this a very well-built guitar and offers tremendous value for the money.

What a fantastic instrument

Harley Benton has taken their production quality to the next level with this one. A gorgeous paint job while being smooth and comfortable to play. The pickups give all the bite you'll ever need and the fretwork and neck are a joy to behold.