Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit Single Cut Reviews

Great Kit, just reporting...

Here's the final result and description of the process:

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Unfortunately, the front pliers were kinda ugly...not a nice top as in the picture. That said the end results came out awesome.

If you plan to stain the wood as I did, be aware that the wood sealer will be a PAIN to sand down. (would be better if they provided kits without any sealer) ..is specially difficult on the sides.

Overall, after sanding the wood has responded nicely to the dye, no problems at all with that. Went for Turquoise on the front and Red on the back, quite nice!

The neck is quite good! thin and the wood is quite robust. The hardware is also good, but I'm replacing the tuners with Grovers.

The bridge, well...really not the best, you can see is gonna catch the string after a bend....so I'm replacing it with a Göldo roller bridge. Be aware that the Göldo comes with smaller studs, so you'll need to redrill or fill the gap with something (I'm gonna use bits from a hose from a talkbox, it works perfectly)

I'm right now in the lacking process, so I cannot review the sound yet....I expect it to be more or less like my vintage Harley Benton which sounds lovely.

UPDATE:

I just finished the project.

Some tips:

- The nut comes REAL high! I suggest you to get a ruler and measure your best set guitar, take the nut out of the neck of this kit and carefully sand it down until is right...DONT TOUCH THE SLOTS they're perfect, is only the nut that is pretty high...otherwise you'll have intonation problems mostly on the first fret.

Hell, is almost impossible to properly play a bar chord at the first fret if you don't do that, after the nut is lowered the guitar plays like heaven.

- Try to avoid using the tuners and bridge that comes with it. They're simply not the best (good but there are better). Get a Göldo roller bridge and some Grover mini tuners.

- Use a piece of guitar string to be able to easily pass the cables that goes from the control cavity to the switch cavity.

- Don't forget to ground the electronics to the strings via the ground cable that goes to the bridge stud.

- Mark the cables before unplugging the switch. If you get lost install it all and plug the guitar then use a piece of metal (rounded small wrench works) and carefully tap the pickups to know whats going on until is right.

- Don't forget to lub the nut with graphite.

UPDATE: I've installed a locking nut and a Schaller stoptail with microtuners. Best decision ever!

UPDATE 2: Changed the original pickups which are very dull to a pair of Seymour Duncan hot rodded kit. They sound awesome.

Great Kit...

If you fancy a bit of fun then this is for you..!!! Easy to build great little set up paint stain or set light to it..!!! Looks great and the weight is perfect...

Easy to put together

I Bought this to try out how to build, and experience the electric part of an instrument, wasn't that hard to put together. The hardest part for me was to get the paint well done!

Really good "learn how to" build/replace and maintaining your instrument. would recommend other strings from the beguinning. Also the volume potentiometer would like to be replaced due to the volumedifferences in 1 -2 on the knob from lowest to highest volume

Overall, nice kit for almost no money!

Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit Single Cut

Very nice and affordable guitar kit, parts are well finished, mechanics are OK, and the final instrument is quite pleasant to the eyes. I cannot tell about its sound with the original pickups as these have been replaced by a couple of active EMG ones. The original strings have not been used but replaced by some D'Addario ones (EXL110). That combination of pickups/strings/body provided a good and powerful sound to my ears, but sound is very subjective to describe, it was ok for me.

For me, the main interest for such kit is the fact that this is the perfect occasion to learn about this instrument, how it works and get more experienced about fine tuning such as neck straightness, lowering action, adjusting intonation and pickup height. This is also a good learning process for some DIY works such as fret filing/polishing.

The action could be lowered at 1.5mm / 2.0mm at the 12th fret for the 1st and 6th strings respectively with no buzz, but this required slight filing of 2 frets.

Recommended stuff for those who wants to learn and willing to perform some DIY tasks, the final result is surprisingly good overall.

Harly Benton Guitar Kit

Good item it was fun building the guitar no problems .

Good quality body an neck

The Volume controls are just on or off no decrease or increase in volume when turning them up and down.

apart from that for the price its a usable instrument for playing live

I know because I have done it

Harley benton guitar kit

Finally put the guitar together,very impressed,for the price and shipping,i decided to colour the headstock and body,looks great,everything went in how it should first time,put a strip of sandpaper in the neck pocket just to tilt it very slightly,an sorted,just a very slight if any adjustment with the allen key and done!! Picks ups are a bit weak,gna change those soon probably,put no probs with tuning or it staying in tune,mega value,all shipped safe an secure as usual,enjoyed building it.

Well worth a shot, A great guitar can come from this kit, with time.

A great kit for the money. A well balanced and decent sounding guitar can be made from this kit with some time, patience and a little common sense.

Having assembled many guitars from parts, both refurbished and hand-crafted, I wanted to try these kits to really see if a good guitar could come from such a stock collection of parts. It can. You'll need a little knowledge of wood-working technique to get a decent end result as some modification of the existing parts (namely the body-neck joint and bridge positioning) can be necessary to achieve the best overall playability.

The stock hardware is fair in quality, there is always room for improvement. I opted to remove the solderless wiring loom in favour of a simpler, hand-soldered circuit. With that amendment, the pickups and general sound of the guitar were surprisingly good.

After all that, applying your chosen finish is an absolute hoot!

This is a great product and i recommend following that gut feeling that making guitars could be a laugh ;)

Les Paul on a budget

Bought this model after purchasing the sg has I wanted a little more of a challenge..........but to be honest, it was pretty straight forward to complete. One thing to consider is the neck join to the body - it's a little high so will need to trimmed down about 5mm, please consider this if you want the fret board to be at the correct position - or you can leave as is, and just adjust the hardware to accommodate. Apart from that, everything went together as expected. .... and to be honest, it sounds a lot better than it's price would dictate - overall, and absolute bargain.

I finished mine with a mahogany back, and a natural top....all hand painted/stained....no spraying - and it looks a dream.

If your looking at this kit, buy it...you won't regret it!!!

Good quality for the price

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

2 piece body and 2 piece top, good neck, 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/tailpiece) should be replaced if you want decent sounding and playing guitar.

Great For Price

First, my purpose of buying this item is not playing the guitar, i want to build a guitar with my own custom paintwork. So it's a good start point for beginner makers.

I'm still using it as a practice guitar and I've never had any problems.

It comes with two standart humbuckers with easy harness applied to it which makes electrical components easy to connect to each other.

It took 2-3 hours to assemble but, 4-5 days to apply the paint. I was nearly obsessed with the coatings.

The electrical cables and the strings come along with the guitar are below the average quality. Also you may want to add some shielding to the pickup holes to avoid noise.

The wood's quality is better than the average kit. Actually body come with 3 piece solidbody which absolutely needs sanding for smooth surface.

I have got some photos of my guitar on Instagram ( MR_SELAM )

For better playing experience, you may want to replace pickups and strings.

Pros :

- Customizable

- Cheap

- Above average quality

- High Performance / Price ratio

- Fast international delivery

Cons :

- Jack protection was missing

- Not so detailed manual

- Some parts are not fitting well ( pickguard for example )

Great kit and price, good fun to make too

I have enjoyed making this kit.

The instructions are pretty clear and precise.

Like all DIY kits, it requires a bit of thought before you steam in though, and I would personally recommend that you wire up the pick-ups, switch and jack to test it all works before you put it in the guitar, then dismantle it and fit accordingly.

May sound stupid, but I had a problem with the wiring (my mistake, not the kit) and had to adjust it with the wires in the body, it was a pain!!!

But then as it was my first DIY kit this may be my inexperience showing.

The neck is screw on, but I glued it as well for extra rigidity.

Some of the pre-drilled screw holes were slightly off (wiring and switch cover on the rear of the guitar, nothing that shows) but as the body is not rock hard, these were easily corrected.

The body and neck are great the sound is very good for a £70 guitar, I've played much worse that cost a lot more!!!!

It only really took about 30 mins to set up the action, and intonation and a small tweak on the neck (that's me being pedantic rather than a comment on the guitar quality) and then I was off playing.

It's quite light and has a real good feel.

I beeswaxed the body and neck rather than any other type of finish and it really has brought the grain of the wood out and it looks superb.

If you want to dabble in making a guitar, then this kit is real good value for money.

Do yourself a favour and just buy one of these kits, it's good fun and you get a nice guitar at the end of it too.....

Quite disappointed with this (second) kit... :(

Well, this is in fact my second HB guitar kit. I first purchased the T-style kit, which was quite acceptable. With some upgrades (better pickups and pots, and good strings), it could in fact be a better guitar than my cheap Strat that costs 4 times that price... I know you only get what you pay for, but I'm quite happy with what I got with the T-style kit: a playable guitar that sounds good "as is" and can be upgraded later.

But this LP-style kit is really disappointing ! The electronics is awfull, the pots are "ON/OFF" style and the wiring is completely wrong in the box. The neck is awfull too: some frets raising above the others (not compl. set down in the cut), generating a terrible buzzing sound (especially on the lower E string on my kit), and the nut is so high that it's quite impossible to play open chords because of an incredibly high action at the end of the neck. As I said, "you only get what you pay for", but this time, I feel like I paid too much for an unusable kit... :(

Well, I'm a handyman, and a bit stubborn too... I already solved some of the wiring problems (pickup switch) and will have to re-solder some good pots, but I'll try first to solve the neck problems, which could be a lot more tricky...

If the final result is not playable, this guitar will end up with a paint job on the wall... but that was not my first intention. :(

LP-kit

The kit I ordered looked pretty good, all parts were included. Wood grains on top look superb, on the rear however it didn't look pretty good. First of all, I tested the neck cavity, which needed some sanding to have a good fit. Further inspection revealed that the holes for the small screws were mostly wrong drilled (as on jack plate on body and PU-covers. Overall, these are easilly filled up and redrilled so no big deal. Trying to place the neck showed that 3 of 4 cavity holes are incorrectly drilled (same procedure). I carved the top like the original LP-style. Before spraying some minor sanding needed to be done in order to create a smooth surface. Sprayed mine as a LP goldtop, on the rear in mahagony brown covering the wood grain. Installing the electronics and testing it revealed that installation of pots was wrong (pots acted like a switch, so resoldered it). Upgraded the PU's to WIlkinsons MWCHB and it sounds GREAT! In general, this guitar now looks awesome, and I'm proud to have made it myself which is so much better than buying your already assembled guitar! If you like woodworking, try this to improve your skills!!

a cost-effective way to learn how to build a guitar

the quality of the guitar kit is more than acceptable for this price, but you have to be prepared to make a few adjustment and fixes by yourself.

my kit had a broken solder joint that had to be repaired, and the neck adjustment took a lot of time. also the basswood body seems to be prepared for full color painting, and it has surface coating, so i had to sand it off to apply water-based wood taint.

the sound is surprisingly good for the price, but you have to have a decent set of strings. forget the ones in the package, they are only good for setting up the guitar.

overall, the product is unbeatable for this price. not only it's a valuable experience to build your own guitar, you can also experiment with all sorts of customizations, and learn how to set-up intonation, adjust the truss rod and make your own color scheme.

not good....

i may have to deal with a defective piece but

BODY WOOD : outside surface was nice and smooth,but EVERY cavity was full of splinters...had to sand quite a lot to make it at least bearable...on the neck cavity there was some sort of hole,that was filled up with glue and wood chips and was not sanded down at all....

ELECTRONICS : way too much wire for one guitar....could barely fit it into the cavities...i liked the way they have made it so that you dont have to solder anything...but one of the wire broke on the soldered connection and i had to reconnect it with some more wire...overall not bad electronics.....

SCREWS : this was a nightmare....i had to re-drill almost EVERY screw hole....the pickup frames,the keys on the headstock....almost everything....

PLASTICS : they had a really cheap feel....but not bad....what bothered me was that the control cavity cover was not cut the right way and doesnt have a good fit....

NECK-BODY JOINT : i really dont know what to say about this.....since the guitar is a curved top,the fretboard should be parallel to the body's angle where they connect.....on mine they are not....i could really stick my finger under the strings and still not touch them....i have to fill the screw holes on the neck,make a new angles piece that will be stuck on the neck joint,and then re-join them...

OVERALL : if you dont mind having some real work to do besides a simple assembly its nice....otherwise its a bit too messy

lp

brilliant guitar brilliant finish first rate sound will be buying from you again brilliant all round looks and sounds like a fully made Les Paul brought to get back to ace frehley and kiss am very well pleased with this guitar first one i brought outstanding on delivery no problems at all fantastic

DIY with a lot less effort

Ever wanted to make your own guitar? It's a lot of work, but this made is a hell of a lot easier.

Basically all you need to do is assemble all the parts. Painting should probably be done before assembly though :)

The parts are treated with a finish, so if you like the natural look, you're golden. Just assemble and rock on.

If you want to paint it I'd recommend sanding it first. Normal hobby paint (for wood use) will actually peel off if you strike it with anything until it's lacquered.

Also, the knobs are amber-ish in color while the plates are cream white (as seen in the picture), so make sure you've planned your build. Make sure your knobs, pickguard, pickup frames, jack plate, control plate, bridge and everything match ;)

Harley Benton LP guitar kit

H i bought the Harley Benton LP kit just over a year a go now and it has been a great guitar kit ever since, it is one of my favorite cheap guitar kits i have used it loads, the only problem i found with the kit is the fact that the pot knobs once on will not come off without damaging the pots, but this can be easily solved buy buying tome cheap knobs, but other than that it has been a great kit i did replace the pickups with some old EMG Hetfields to improve the tone. all together a great guitar kit for the price i would happily buy another kits just as a little project.

thanks rammstein

Harley Benton Les Paul Kit

Great fun to build, excellent quality - compared to my first build of another make from a UK supplier, and plays really well. I'm going to order another one. Great super-fast shipping, as always. Thanks!

Great guitar, BUT.

I really love these guitar kits, worth every penny. I do music few times a week to make my rent.

When these kits are assembled (carefully), they're a nice piece of kit, they sound and play better than a ready built guitar at up to four or five the price, they look much better too, with all the fancy extras & trim.

I did the telecaster kit a while back, which almost fell together on my kitchen table. It looks sounds & plays so good, without problems or replacement parts at all.

This LP is every bit as good as the Telle I built. I prefer it to my real & genuine LP.. I like the natural wood finish straight from the box & use it just like that. It also plays (when my aged fingers allow) just as good as my original LP.

Then I messed with wiring from from online electric guitar sites & now have some sweet sounds from push, pull tone & volume knobs which swap pickup polarity &, or "cut" to single coil p'ups, my favorite sound is from all the pickups in series, all good fun when out with the band hitting the audience with "new, unheard" guitar sounds.

This particular LP kit was a little awkward, pickup screw holes did not line up, only needed re'drilling, also the wiring had an earth link missing, it all worked OK, but knowing there was more, I visited stewmac.com for some wicked wiring diagram ideas.

So don't screw the pickups down until you get the strings on so you can center the pickups using the strings as a guide, then screw them down.

This guitar kit now looks, plays & sounds great, although I do have a genuine Gibson LP guitar, the Gibson is very heavy compared with this HB kit guitar, apart from that there's little difference HB has a bolt on neck which I prefer, because it is easily adjustable, or replaceable. The Gibson has a integral neck which is neither easily adjustable or replaceable.

There is everything but a plectrum in the box. Do read the "setup" section in the book as this will help understand how all electric guitars need setting up regularly for sound and play'ability, although neither of mine needed much setting up at all.

A very important part of most LP's, genuine or not, is the NUT LUBRICANT, graphite or silicone grease. This stops the "usual" tuning problems associated with the Gibson shape (back angled) head stock.