Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit JA Reviews

Cheap DIY kit for designers and other creative people

pros: affordable, good looking and has a really nice pickups for its price.

cons: poor quality of wood and strings, but it`s doesn`t seems as a big problem

hi from russia 0_*

Great project material

I was really surprised by the quality of this guitar set. There's a lot of work that has to be put in to it to make it top notch, but it's worth the time and it's a great practice starter kit.

Excellent D.I.Y kit

Bought this as a project to do with my dad as i get more into modding, painting an building guitars.

It is an easy to assemble kit although i will say a bit of knowledge on guitar setup and generally being good with your hands will get you a long way!

This is without a doubt worth the money! Gives you a good idea of the parts and pieces used in building electric guitars, you can have a bit of fun choosing the paints etc that you want for your colour and at the end you have a great guitar ( for the price ) that you put together and painted yourself ( one of a kind )

Well worth the money especially for beginners!

Very nice and inexpensive

Good way too start in DIY

Really good value

I wanted a guitar with p90 pickups to add to my collection and after looking at various reviews thought I'd have a go at my first build. Very well packaged, good instructions and very happy with the final result. There is a great satisfaction in building your own guitar the way you want it. You cannot fault it as a budget guitar and although I was thinking about upgrading some components after playing it I don't think I really need to. The neck especially is superb.

Alot of patience and attention to detail pays off in the end. Minimal tools required too.

Great kit

First of all this is a great kit.

Pros: freaking cheap, complete freedom of modding. Lightweight - it is the most lightweight guitar I have. Pickups are OK (ceramic magnet). Great pickguard (much better than one at the picture)

Cons: body cavities seems to be cut with bad route bit. Wood not cut clearly. Not a big problem thiugh.

Fingerboard has 3mm long deep saw chip - can be filled with epoxy or superglue. Tuners are very poor, I'd recommend to replace them just from the beginning with any HB's or anything.

I finished my kit with surf green color, defretted the neck (yes, it is fretless now!), cut headstock like on other HB's, replaced tuners, made pickups series/parallel/phase switchable.

It is a great guitar now! Worth every penny!

I would recommend,Great, but you will probably need to learn some things. Not one for a parent and kid to make unless parent kno

So....we got two of these. it is a lot of guitar for the price.

The cons: no hole drilled for earthing the metalware, needed a fret levelling with several high frets. Pickups had varying output. The pots are not right for p90s and the input is flimsy. So...Replaced them.

The middle ground: Machine heads were better than I expected. Wiring is not great and there is a lot of excess wire.

Pros: neck was straight as an arrow, the switch was fine all the holes lined up. It can be made very good and it is excellent value. Mine is but took a lot of learning. You will need a fret rocker, some 800 or 1000 grit paper and an abrasive straight edge. Get this of you want a project. If you just want a cheap, playable guitar, get the HB the 70 or the HB jazzmaster.

Very interesting project.

This was my first project guitar build . Although the holes and pick guard were not aligned properly I did get all the screws in. The rubber inserts were missing in my kit . The whole thing took me 2 hrs to complete . I stained the body with wax polish . It looks very nice . I have not had p90s in a guitar before . Not as big sounding as my harley Benton black tele with humbuckers They are ok . The guitar itself feels good to play . I would not hesitate to recommend this kit . I do like the push fit electrics . I may upgrade the pickups or at least the bridge . It was fairly easy to set up.

A nice kit

i ordered this, to experiment working on a guitar. It is easy to assembly and most of the parts fitted nicely (minus some pickguard holes). The sound is ok, the body ok (thinner than a normal ja guitar), the neck is very good, bridge and tuners ok. The manual in the box was an older version, and that was a bit confusing, as for example the foam inserts were described in it, but are currently not included in the package. Anyways, a fun project, i have dismantled it again and i'm working to refine the neck and body and probably and probably swap the electronics

Great for the price

My second kit I did the SG kit already. The kit is easy to do I painted mine peach and it looks good with the pickguard color. It took maybe an hour and a half to assemble. I put on good strings and tossed the ones that come with it. I did a basic setup and tuning and it sounds great. I am very pleased with the purchase.

Fun project, surprisingly good guitar

I bought this kit last year as a lockdown project and I'm really happy with the results. The assembly was easy and instructions were clear (except that the bridge and neck pickups were not marked as such and there was no way to tell them apart -- not sure it mattered ;-O). The neck is great, worth the price of the guitar imho. I polished the frets. The fret ends could probably use a file but I don't have one so I'm living with them. The guitar worked well with included parts but was greatly improved with new Kluson MK6LN Tuners and a new Graph Tech TUSQ XL F-Style Slotted Nut, both of which fit easily. So far I'm keeping the pickups as they actually sound ok. I actually love the finished product and play it all the time. Thinking about getting another one!

Great Kit at an unbelievable low price

Have just finished build and I'm really pleased with final result, My friend works in a car body repair shop so I got him to spray body - Mazda Metallic Black - looks awesome. Have had to do very little adjustments to make this a really playable and great sounding guitar

Looks good and plays well after a bit of hard work.

The neck wouldn’t sit in the body right. There was a gap between the end of the fretboard and the body. It took a bit of careful chiselling and some work with a dremmell to get it to fit with no gap. I could have easily messed that up if I was not concentrating. Once that was sorted the rest went ok with the easy to follow instructions. I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the pickups. The guitar sounds very nice. The body took the paint well and gave a nice smooth finish. Looks good and plays well. Can’t ask for more than that.