Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style 5-stars Reviews

Value for money

Great starting kit with better than average quality

Amazing craftsmanship

Wasnt expecting much from this thing at all, but I didnt even have to level the frets or anything.

The only critique is that the frets weren't polished, but that is easily fixed.

The pickups ofcourse sound thin and tinny, which is to be expected at this price point, but they would do the job for a beginner, and otherwise easily swapped out by an expert. I love it.

Great starter/workhorse guitar

This great little guitar recently joined my axe army to fill the role of workhorse/allround guitar.

It's quite impressive considering how cheap it is.

It has a 14'' radius fretboard, a modern C-shape neck (I could be compared to a '50s gibson neck, quite chubby but not unpleasant) with a smooth satin finish.The rosewood fretboard is quite thick (surely thicker than on my Strat), the frets are well placed and leveled, although fairly rough: I had to polish them with steel wool. The trussrod is precise. The body is fairly consistent in weight, sporting a well designed contour-body, although the routings for pickups and bridge are a little tight (I slightly widened them with a dremel).

The machine-heads keep the guitar tuned, even when abusing the tremolo, but their gear ratio is too small, re-tuning is more laborious than it should be. I changed them with gotoh locking tuners, now the guitar is as stable as a floydrose. The bridge is fairly cheap, and not very precise, bearing tuning problems and lack of sustain. I strongly advice an upgrade to a decent wilkinson 5+1 (I did, excellent upgrade).

Soundwise, the guitar handles excellently, the pickups are not bad and akin to vintage, thin sounds. However, a good set of pickups can turn this cheap studio guitar into a serious instrument, if backed by the aforementioned Bridge and tuners mods, with a final cost dwelling just under 300¤. That's quite a feat.

Rock on!

Great instrument to learn DiY and playable

I got this instrument simply as a workbench to learn on how to put a guitar together and set it up without being afraid of ruining an expensive guitar and boy was I amazed.

I got it together in no time and it was an enjoyable experience. Setting it up was also easy. The truss rod works well and got a good setup for my tastes.

The only downfall of this guitar is that the pickups are very low output and very bright. I'm considering changing those to make this guitar usable.

Also don't expect a good solid body and it does have a couple of cosmetic imperfections. Nothing that a good sanding and finish won't cover though. Also it is very light weight, which can make it a good practice/rehearsal guitar if you're spending a long time with a guitar on your shoulder, as a heavy weight one would not feel good on your back after long rehearsals/practice.

Excellent

This is the second Harley Benton guitar kit I have bought as I previously bought their T-style Kit. The kit assembled nicely without any problems and is very easy for those with little or no knowledge to undertake.

The guitar when assembled also plays and sounds very well for a guitar at this price point. I would definitely recommend this product to those interested.

Amazing!

I wasn't expecting much for my 68 Euros, but it was apparent when it arrived that this was a quality, well-thought-out kit. EVERYTHING included, not a screw missing, decent enough neck and a nicely finished bare wood body (albeit not the most expensive timber).

I wanted the guitarto fit in a Seymour Duncan Humbucker (I had taken off another guitar), so I decided to give it a full custom job on the paintwork! The only mistake I made was not getting the right lacquer for the finish. To be honest, I am not sure what this should be...I have done one custom paint job using car lacquer, and this one I used wood lacquer...but the finish is a bit soft...Would recommend going for a polyurathane lacquer if you do it...and good luck finiding that in a spray can!

Back to teh guitar itself...I put on the fully-loaded pickup set supplied and was amazed at the quality of those...In the end I've decided to sell the Seymour Duncan and stick with the stock pickups! At some stage I may put some EMG Active Pickups in, but for the time being, I am jsut enjoying the sound of a guitar I built! I think a Bass will be next on the list

My first guitar!!!

I bought this kit because i wanted to do my very own electric guitar and being a ST-style fan i decided to go ahead and buy it. The first things that i noticed when I opened the kit was the wood, the body of the guitar, which seemed kind of those vintage guitar bodies, and that one of the tremolo springs was broken. So, about the wood and the body i was very surprised because it seem to be a very good wood to paint and varnish. And it was. On the other hand, the spring was broken and it got me a little worried, because i didn't knew if only two springs would do the job, so i put those parts all together and, for now, they are doing allright. About the electrical parts, they are very easy to put together and they sound fine. Actully, for me it ended to be a very good guitar.

Great Bang For Your Buck

This was my first guitar and I was sceptical about how good a Guitar as cheap as this one would be, but it exceeded all my expectations and was totally worth it. The wood and parts were all not high-end as you may expect, but in my latest build I spent way more money on just the body, so I think this is definitely the best option you could take to get the most out of your money.

My own design.

I really like the Statocaster body shape but did not want to build a Stratocaster! I carefully looked over the body to see what could be done. Mine came in 3 pieces of basswood, light yet resonant. Two parts had good grain match, the last piece was not- a solid finish it had to be. I sanded the cut contours to a deeper finish (forearm arm and rib-cage contours) and routed the pick up cavities to accept any pick up. I then decided to mount all the pu's at an angle, like the bridge pu.

I then designed a 3-piece mounting pick guard without the typically Fender jack socket plate to be a simple flat surface mount and rearranged the switch and control knob positions.

The headstock shape was next. After many drawings and a look on the net to see if I'd by accident copied any other design, I cut the profile. Also rounded the neck to headstock profile. Finished with amber tint cellulose it turned out very well. The maple even had some birdseye figuring! Frets polished and rosewood board oiled.

Now the hard and expensive part - how to finish the body? I went for midnight blue boat enamel thinned down and using a good brush...allright from a foot or more. Cellulose lacquer is expensive with additional postage charges and hard to get. It is also soft and on basswood will dent and scratch very easily.

The tremello bridge and tuners passed my 'fit for purpose' inspection and went on the guitar...stays in tune alright but both feel seem a little stiff when operating. Live with it. Pick ups are ceramic flat plate types under non magnetic polepieces and sound like an electric guitar! I am not a "tone" obsessive person. A magnetic field is just a magnetic field! In fact your strings are more important for a good tone. The magnets simply impart a weak magnetism within steel/nickel strings and then the strings vibrate...the moving field intersects the coil windings and that, folks, is the induced signal sent to the amp!

To conclude - I built the kit to look as different as a Strat could possibly be from parts that pass muster. The best thing is that the neck fitted the pocket nice and tight and the resulting combination resonates nicely with reasonable sustain and " twangy-ness"! Pleased by the result...

Very easy build

It's true. This was a very easy build. Almost plug and play, well not quite. The body was ready to be painted although I decided to keep it a natural colour and jus t wax it.mthe result was excellent.

Wiring was easy as this was all done for me, all I had to do was bolt the electronics into the housing. Likewise the neck simply bolted in place.

I know very little about building a guitar and I understand that using copper to shield the pickups is a normal thing. But that was not required here.

There were plenty of videos around showing how to set up intonation and and other adjustments. I must admit I didn't need to muck around to much and as soon as I plugged it in the sound was great. The action was a little high at first go but I soon sorted that and now I have a great sounding guitar.??

Great value kit

This was the first DIY kit I have made and I would not hesitate to buy another HB kit.

The quality of the kit is very good. The neck and body were excellent quality and fit together perfectly without any need for adjustment or shim. I brought this kit as a platform to make my own partscaster. I replaced the pickups, pots and tuners and now have a guitar that sounds much better than the money spent on it.

Overall a great kit, and a lot of fun to build.

Better than expected

When you order a guitar kit you do not expect the resulting guitar to be comparable to a highend product and of course that is also the case with the Harley Benton ST kit.

I bought the guitar to acquaint myself with the mechanisms of an electric guitar such as the bridge and how to set intonation, truss rod to set the action and finally the electronics. To that end this kit is perfect.

What I didn't expect was that the result is an utterly playable strat copy with a lovely neck and reasonable tone. It will not compare to a proper fender but for my purposes it fits the bill.

Present for someone

This went down a treat at Christmas, not only was it a fun project but plays and feels like a guitar you would try and buy in a shop. Pickups are dead on, all round great purchase

Good

I saw many bad kits that cost more than this with lower quality.

4 piece body, nice cutted and shaped, correctly drilled. I ordered 2 of these kits, one of this come with very beautiful flame maple neck, I was shocked. Fretwork as expected poor, but anyway I will refret this and change nut. You can leave the parts that don't affect on sound, but other parts (pickups, electronics, tuners and bridge) should be replaced if you want decent sounding and playing guitar.

HB Strat Kit

Very good kit, once assembled, plays lovely, sounds like an authentic strat. I looked at squire and fender strats and to be fair, all the specs right up to about £250 were basewood bodies. I bought this kit with the intention of changing pick ups etc etc....didn't have to, I basically painted it then rubbed it down and trashed it. when people see it the ask if I have a

Rory Gallagher Strat.....Fantastic value for money

A Red Hot Value Guitar Project.

I've just finished making my: Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit ST-Style, guitar. I made it for my son, with a dragon theme, & here's how. I carved a serpent style dragon on the front, & on the back I carved two dragons in flight, one with it's wings spread wide open. It was then given a ruby red paint job. I inlaid brass jewelry findings for the heads of each dragon, & replaced all the chrome metalwork with brass fittings, including a chunky cast brass jackplate. I also fitted gold plastic pickup covers, switch tip & tremolo arm tip. I added brass control knobs with Abalone caps, & put a winged cross on the neck plate. I swapped the pickguard for one with an image of reptile skin on it. For the tremolo cover plate I had a dragons head engraved onto the back of a gold mirror plate, which gives a great effect. I was lucky to win a very nice neck - highly inlaid with Abalone & mother of pearl - on eBay, along with a set of Zebrano wood machine head buttons, also inlaid with Abalone & mother of pearl. To finish it off I added a red fender logo strap, held in place by brass elliptical strap buttons & beer bottle washer strap locks. All-in-all this is a great guitar project & I recommend anyone wanting to buy a guitar on a limited budget to have a go at making one of the Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kits. "Rock On" mddwoody.

A good introduction to electric guitar building

A useful kit for the beginner, the quality is generally good and at the price you can definitely afford to make much needed modifications. Try the included pickups first and then throw them away and really begin to experiment with pickups, switches and also the action! Treat this as a test bed for your own ideas and it is a bargain. I strongly suspect that this is the same kit that is branded by many well known manufacturers of affordable instruments. The body is solid wood, not ply, although you won't be surprised to learn the wood is mainly bits pieced together. Beginner builder bargain.

Love it!

Let's cut to the chase. The important things to know is that the wood is basswood, it has 22 frets, and the pickups aren't exactly fantastic, but are of a similar standard to squier strats.

I bought this with the plan of changing the stock pickups. When I first got it, I put it together with the original pickups just to hear it, and it sounds okay, but not a guitar I would take onto stage. After replacing the pickups with some more expensive hot rods the guitar has become a dream to me. 22 fret means easy soloing, and with a little adjusting I also managed to get the action lower than normal with minimum buzzing.

Basswood is what a lot of cheaper guitars are made of, but even some more expensive ones are too because of its tone qualities. Just one note, basswood is easily dented so extra care is required.

I recommend this kit for those interested in making a guitar for the first time. It's definitely a worthwhile investment as it can be upgraded with better pickups later. The main parts of the guitar that matter to me (the neck, frets and bridge) are all good!

Very happy with this buy!

Build It Yourself Strat Set

Great set, nice woods - grain in body comes up lovely when lacquered and finished properly! Pickups are basic, but have a good strong output! and the tuners are the basic of basic, but these can easily be changed! I am also very please with the 'cut it yourself' headstock... you can design your own shape!

woodwork lessions

Kit is perfect suited for the swedish curricullum in the woodwork subject

though im working as teacher in woodwork at swedish school in London ive found out the Harley Benton kits is well suited for the older pupils (14 - 16 year). pls let me know if you want pics from progress

Woodwork teacher

KC