Harley Benton DC-Junior Faded Cherry Reviews

Wow!

I'd read the hype, the reviews, the forums and watched the vids and, after a lot of consideration I pulled the trigger!

I thought all the claims about perfect finish and setup were a little optimistic but no. The finish was flawless, although being a matt finish, it was a little grainy in places. Nothing big enough to be seen but I could feel the odd speck under my fingers, now mostly disappeared after a few days playing. Setup was almost spot-on, just a slight sharpness on two strings but not enough to worry about until I do a string change and the action was just right. I haven't measured it yet but it plays very nicely! I usually play 9's and this guitar comes strung with 10's, but they suit it down to the ground so I may keep them.

The Roswell P90 pickup is a revelation. There are a huge range of tones available and the sounds I'm getting from a modified Fender Champion 600 range from very sweet and clean to dark and gnarly at the turn of a knob. I haven't opened it up, either sonically or physically so I can't speak for its performance through a larger amp or comment on pot and capacitor values but they seem very well matched.

Fit and finish is exceptional for the price with a nice thick pickguard, well finished frets, good tuners and a general air of quality.

Even though this guitar is a fantastic buy I do have some gripes. There are some sharp edges on the bridge which are a bit uncomfortable when hand muting. Similarly the fretboard side of the nut can dig in to your hand during certain open chords. Both of these are small niggles which can be easily sorted though and don't really detract from what is an excellent guitar at any price.

Excellent at this price but . . .

Always liked the DC Junior type guitar. Simple no nonsense .

So decided to get this HB "clone" as I've got a couple of other HBs that , for the price , I've been impressed by the quality.

I realised a long time ago that, especially with guitars, you more or less get what you pay for. This is true up to a point, but with HB you get, in my opinion more bang for buck. Quality of build is good on this guitar and the finish is unblemished. Good Wilkinson tuners, an ADJUSTABLE, wrap around bridge which seems fine and full size tone and volume potentiometers. Not familiar with Roswell pickups but this P90 sounds on point.. Medium weight .

Now the "but" : . . . . Expect to have to adjust truss rod, action and intonation to achieve the best playability of this instrument. One thing that was lucky was that when I was adjusting the action (string height) screwing the bridge down I reached my required action when the bridge was screwed virtually all the way down. If you want ridiculously low action then you may struggle. The truss rod reacted well to adjustments. The nut was obviously hastily cut and at some point I'll replace it with a black one. It is these "lack of set up" out of the box, so so nut , that keeps the price point at very affordable. If I didn't have to do that I would have given 5 stars for quality and overall, but with features, hey, it's a single pickup simple guitar, so difficult to give five stars !

Bottom line I really like this guitar. Properly set up it's a keeper, with upgraded nut and possibly P90 it would be a no brainer.

A terrific guitar for the price.

I have upgraded the pickup already and will put in better potentiometers as well. The fit and finish of this guitar are both very acceptable, and the fretwork is really quite impressive, The tuners and bridge are both surprisingly good for this price point. Tonally this is a wonderful guitar regardless of price. I am truly astounded by this guitar. I bought it to fill a void while saving up for a much more expensive version, but I will hang on to this one even if I buy a high end Junior style guitar in the future. It is that good. It is everything the classic design it echoes should be.