Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit T-Style Reviews

For the price one of the best!

For the price you probably can't get a better guitar. It sounds pretty good. The neck pickup is really warm and sounds amazing for lead and clean parts. The bridge is for me personally a bit too trebly/cutting through, this is a personal preference however and it can easily be fixed with the tone knob. All the other hardware is pretty decent too. Stays in tune pretty well and plays very nice. Neck has a smooth satin-like finish in a C shape.

There's one bad thing however, this might be exclusive to my unit, but it has some necktilt which makes the guitar almost unplayable in the higher frets (starting at the 8th). This can be fixed with a shim which i plan on doing. This may be exclusive to my unit as i've not seen other complaints about this.

Also in assembly 2 solder joints broke off, not much of an issue for me, but i can imagine people want to keep it fully solderless (which it otherwise is)

Great little kit

I bought this some time ago and build with my dad our own first hand assembled guitar. It was a great experience. Unfortunately the first one that I got was a dud, and I decided to return it immediately. If you get one with a couple of construction holes in it, return it. But for really small amount of money you get a decent playable T-style guitar. Lovely DIY.

Good kit to work with, but not a guitar one can assemble and play right away

PROS.

1. Technically, this kit allows you to follow an IKEA-like manual and put together a guitar, functionally identical to a cheap guitars of well-known-brands-we-won?t-mention-here for a fraction of their price.

2. The body and the neck are done surprisingly well for a price, they fit together better than I saw on some? ahem? much more expensive guitars. Frets don?t try to cut you to death. Neck is not bent to a propeller shape. Slots in the body for neck and pickups are precise enough.

3. Other parts are inexpensive yet mostly funcional. I planned to replace everything except body and neck, but left tuning machines, bridge and some other things be: they are okay to the level when ?good enough? turns into ?just good?.

CONS.

1. Frets require some work. Frets are unpolished (which is not a problem) and sometimes are slightly uneven (which IS a problem). So if you need a low action without buzzing, fret leveling is in order, and fret leveling is not a task for a complete newbie.

Nut is a regular plastic thing, and it is not set to a proper height. To get a proper action and proper tone, you should cut it to the right height, which requires some minimal understanding of the task, some skills and at least some tools. So, again, not a task for a complete newbie.

2. There?s no shielding and a kit manual never mentions that shielding is required, which could become a problem for a newbie. You?ll need to shield a guitar with foil or graphite, otherwise it will work like a good old radio antenna, buzzing left and right.

3. Build quality is not perfect when it comes to a small things. All screw holes, including holes for neck bolts, are hand-drilled sloppily, which means random depth and direction of each and every hole. If you suffer from serious case of perfectionism, just like me, it?s easier to seal and redrill those holes. Otherwise you probably can ignore it: screws still hold it together, so it?s okay. Tip: always use a wax on screws, it helps.

Fingerboard of my guitar had a small splotch of some brownish substance that tried (with questionable success) to mask a small dent in a wood. It didn?t affect playability, but it wasn?t nice to look at form close distances, so it had to be fixed.

Tone control in my kit wasn?t working. It wasn?t a problem for me, as I just replaced all electronics. But such things could be a problem for some kiddo, who doesn?t know how to solder wires yet. Be ready to rewire the guitar properly.

CONCLUSION.

In general, this kit is a good base for amateur guitar builds and experiments. Reshape the body, paint it wild, cut the head as you please, add pickups of your dreams... Kit has no critical flaws and allows you to build a really good ?semi-custom? guitar for a ridiculously low price if you are ready to put some work in it.

Kit is ?technically functional? even right after screwdriver assembly and basic tuning, but don?t expect much from it. Fifteen minutes of intense screwdriving will turn a kit into an electromechanical tool, which in a dim light could be considered an electric guitar. But it won?t rise to its full potential without additional efforts.

Great kit guitar to learn about building guitars

The fretwork was not perfect, but it was easy to sort out. I replaced the electronics and pickups with higher end stuff .

This is a fantastic kit. Since I got it, the telecaster has become my favorite guitar. This kit is easy to assemble and set up, except maybe for the headstock. You need some tools to do that, but the result can be anything your desire. The strings that come with the kit are no good, so it's best to order a decent set right from the start. Another thing that could be better is the neck dive ; a heavier body would better counteract this.

Great project

I was pleasantly surprised with how good this was. It feels and sounds great. But of course it had its flaws. I was a few screws short and the frets needed some levelling. Other that that. After solving those its now one of my favourite guitars and was great fun working on it

Good for diy starters

Easy to assemble, the body is ok, but the neck is not the best, it may take some time do polish all the frets. The parts aren't all that good but everything is easy to connect. For someone trying some diy is a solid enough project to get started.

reasonable price the main motive

Decent!

Fun to assemble, not too hard, and the wood seems good enough, with some nice picks it can be a very good Tele. I left my one just raw without any varnish and looks/feels good

Great intoduction to guitar building!

For the price it can't really be faulted, the body and neck alone are worth more than the price price of the entire kit.

OK so the sound is not as good as Seymour Duncan or Fender OEM, but what do you expect from an inexpensive kit? The pickups and electronics are perfectly functional and and the sound is more than acceptable in it's own right.

The whole kit is accurately cut, routed and drilled and goes together well. My only criticism is that the body comes pre sealed so if you want to stain it, which I did, it requires a bit of elbow grease and some fine sanding to get back to bare wood, but that's not really a criticism as if you want to spray paint it which I imagine most will, then it will save you work by not needing to seal it.

All in all a great value kit, buy it - you won't be disappointed!

Amazing value for money

Very good value for money. Turned out to be a very good quality guitar. The neck is good, the action low. The bridge pick up screams just like a Tele. The neck pick up is as warm as a top quality GL strat.

This is the second kit I have made, the other being a Single Cut. I was very pleased with the Single Cut, but I am absolutely delighted with this. I have kept the body unpainted, just sanded smooth and thin varnished with a cloth application. The result is like an aged natural tele.

This plays like a £500 Tele.

Others have commented on a neck weight issue. I have not noticed this with mine? maybe HB have sorted this out?

The only upgrades are D'addario strings and a set of strap locks.

If you fancy a Tele kit, that results in a very playable guitar, go for this. It has turned out good enough to gig with.

A great Guitar for home recording.

I play mainly acoustic guitar these days "Gibson Hummingbird" and thought as I record a lot I might get an electric guitar to do some lead accompaniments. I always fancied a Telecaster but not wanting to spend that kind of money I decided to go for a kit. I did not expect much but as I was going to record directly into my computer based recording software I thought it would do the job. I varnished the body, polished the frets " which is advisable " use very fine wet or dry paper or steel wool, shaped the head to my liking then assembled it all. I used the strings supplied to tension the neck to allow me to adjust the bridge and truss rod which was very easy to do. I will change the strings after leaving the neck to settle and adjust if needed. The bridge, finger plate, knobs and machine heads are far better weight and quality than I expected. The neck also feels very good. Time to plug in and try, I am absolutely delighted with the sound from the pickups. I do not have an amplifier so can not vouch for the sound through one, but through my computer software it sounds like a very high quality guitar. All that said I would highly recommend this kit to anyone, When my musician friends saw and heard the guitar they thought I had got myself a Fender Telecaster and would not believe it was a kit I made up. For this price I would go for it, I may just get another one.

great guitar kit but neck heavy

Had great fun assembling this after spending some time applying nitro and lacquer. My only gripe is the the balance of the guitar is very neck heavy (possibly because of the very chunky neck or a lightweight body wood?) the neck is very nicely finished with no rough fret ends but the chunky profile bight be better suited to players used to vintage Gibson type neck profiles. the electrics all work ok and do what they're supposed to. Over all very good as long as you don't mind the balance issue caused by the neck. I weighted the body to compensate but even with that its still a neck diver!

Great kit for amazing price

The idea of building a guitar myself has been in my head for a long time already. Since building everything from scratch would be diving straight into the deep end of the swimming pool, I thought I would start by assembling, finishing and setting up a kit guitar first.

The package and contents of this kit is actually very good, especially considering the price. The body is good quality, the neck is nice and straight and the hardware is also quite nice. Assembly was easy, the instruction manual was well assembled, although not really needed.

The guitar played well right out of the box after initial setup and minor tweaks.

All in all it is a very good starting point for someone interested in working with guitars and learning about guitar setup. With almost endless possibilities for hardware upgrades I believe that the basic kit guitar can be made into a really well playing instrument while learning a thing or two at the same time

Great experience

I bought it for my 12 years old son who is ok with some handiwork and would like to learn some electric guitar. We spent absolutely great weekend putting all parts together to make a musical instrument. That was invaluable experience for both of us. It was complicated enough to think through and work but did not have any real problems. My participation was required only for head shaping and soldering. And setup. My son is happy. He plays instrument that he himself assembled. I am happy about time we spent together assembling it and not spending a fortune on the first instrument.

Does it looks like Fender? No. Does it feels like Fender? I think no. Does it sounds like Fender? To some extent yes. It feels and looks and sounds as a true guitar. And it is actually feels, looks and sounds better that my own first electric guitar I bought in 1994 for 200 USD :-)

Incredibly fun experience

I bought this as a first time Luthier , i had no experience in work working or electronics.

thankfully the guitar comes mostly pre-done yet with enough assembly left that it feels like a accomplishment to put it together and also allows space for creativity in design such as what shape i wanted the headstock and what color i chose to paint the guitar ( i personally stained the wood which was easy for a first timer like me)

Overall the guitar itself sounded very nice and was easy to play with a smooth neck and was a nice weight when worn with a strap.

I would recommend this to a friend and actually already have convinced a friend to buy one for himself and get working on his very own T-style guitar.

Brilliant value and an exciting project

After seeing countless projects being done on youtube, I was very keen to give a try on a DIY kit. Tempted by the Les Paul initially, I went for the T-Guitar, not only because I don't have one, but also because the shapes from Harley Benton have changed a bit, and it would always be a tough act to follow the Gibsons I own anyway.

So far, I have put together the kit and have not yet gone through the staining/oiling process, so I cannot comment on that yet, but I am expecting a fair bit of sanding to do given the nice sealing already performed on the body.

Other than that, it is all mainly positive:

- The neck is very smooth, and well finished. The frets are fine, nothing sharp or uneven. The fingerboard is possibly a bit dry, and will get some lemon oil or similar.

- The body is made of two pieces from what I can see, and while nowhere neer flamed the wood is nice enough that I will want to keep a transparent finish. On the back there are traces of glue I think which will come off with the sanding.

- Neck and body fitted well together. Same for the rest of the pre-drilled holes, with one exception for the volume/tone selector where I redrilled slightly to get a better fit on the screw which is very visible.

- A couple of screws were not properly in factory.

- While it may require a proper set-up, with taking the pick-ups a bit higher, and fiddling with the neck, the intonation seems pretty good out of the box. Definitely playable as is, if anything action is a bit too high on the high notes.

- I damaged the E string when I untangled it from the others. This means it broke after a few minutes of playing. Not the end of the world since I was going to dismantle everything for the finish, but a shame still.

- Connections are extremely simple with just two cables to connect.

Overall, I am very impressed. I am not a big T-guitar enthusiast (or the F brand of guitars), so cannot compare like for like, but it feels to me very good soundwise, playability wise, and it was very easy to put together. Looking forward to the next step now, but at this price, it's a no brainer to recommend getting "your own" guitar.

Value for money

For this price, don't hesitate getting one; It's fun

Present for my father

Bought as a surprise present for my dad, he was amazed and delighted (definitely surprised also!). He had a great time building it, took his time, sanded and filled the body and then used car paint to paint it.

The result is a unique tele that hangs on the wall with pride. For the price I really do recommend this for anyone interested in crafts/music/DIY or all the above!

The neck in particular is great quality and well fretted. The neck pickup is a bit dull but the bridge has the tele twang.

Pleasant surprize

Bought this as an experiment in guitar building and finishing.

Everything was in the box to build what has turned out to be a very respectable Telecaster copy for just over £50 !!!!

Yes the electrics are a bit cheap , but all work fine and its very easy to upgrade any of the hardware should you so wish.

I was very pleased with the body and the way it was finished from the factory. I just gave it a light sand and applied a few coats of Danish oil and it looks great.

The neck was a good fit although the finger board was very dry, again some lemon oil applied and it came up nice.

The frets on the whole were ok just a couple slightly high and were easy to correct. Had great fun designing and cutting the head-stock.

My one criticism /warning is the tops of the intonation

screws on the bridge are very sharp , you soon find this out if like me you tend to palm mute the strings . It was quite difficult to correct with a small needle file ,trying not to damage the slotted top.

Overall very pleased with the finished item , great way to practice setting up a guitar if you have not done it before as its so inexpensive. I even let my son adjust the truss rod something i would not let him touch on my Gibson Les Paul!!