Harley Benton HB-35Plus Cherry 4-stars Reviews

Nice price and quality

Nice product, used for two years as second guitar, sounds great, nice tone.

Good choice for pop and blues style musicians. Red color looks great on photos.

Hb35 plus, cherry

The tuners on this guitar were very cheap, some tight to turn, others just spin round. I replaced these with Wilkinson ez locks

Wasn't sure about the pickups for a while, but they grew on me. The coating on the back of the neck could become sticky, so I sanded back a little. I grew to love this guitar after a while

I would now say it's a pretty good guitar, and will be keeping it

Choose over Epiphone and I’m happy

Great sounding semi-hollow body.

Happy purchase

I've always wanted an ES335 but could never afford a real one so when this alternative came I had no choice but to make an order. And I'm very happy with it.

If I leave the five stars for the much more expensive instruments every aspect of this guitar is amazing for the price. The guitar came set up good. It holds tune well for normal home use but the tuners are the first thing I would upgrade. The neck is nice and set up well but it's a bit wide so I wouldn't recommend it for complete begginers. The finish is flawless. The sound is good. I didn't buy this guitar for the split coils but it's a nice feature to play with.

The only flaw I can point out is the pickguard that was constantly unscrewing while playin and ended up off the guitar which actually looks better without.

Fantastic Guitar

Unbelievably great purchase. Beautiful sound and playability. The split coil sounds phenomenal. The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars is the jack was loose and the internal wiring is a little messy.

Amazing value

Love a lot about this instrument. Great playability and tones.

I recommend changing the strings as soon as you get it.

The construction is top notch for this price range.

Best bang for the buck

Amazing guitar for it's price. Period.

A good budget guitar

I bought this for my partner, who is a beginner/part time player, for her birthday.

As a session musician and guitar tutor, I looked it over when it arrived.

Well packaged, in 2 boxes, the outer box being very sturdy, with the inner box well padded inside.

It is not a AAAA flametop. Maybe a AA.

Bridge posts not fully seated, but not really an issue.

Tuners, ok, solid, hold tune, intonation needed slight adjustment, action ok.

Pickups, great for the price, and with 8 combinations, plenty of variation.

Neck a little dry, but no big deal.

Screw on scratch plate not seated properly, which will require fixing.

Pots a little loose, pull ups fine.

Frets a little scratchy and will need a polish.

This is an entry level guitar, but you get a lot for the money.

It sounds good with lots of scope for variation, the cleans are sparkly, the mids and lows have a nice bit of grunt.

It plays very well, isn't heavy, and I found the neck very comfortable.

I think you'd be hard pressed to find better at this price point, and for a beater, mod project or practice instrument it's a bargain.

Get it set up right, and you could gig with it.

Sure, there are a couple of issues, but I've seen worse on much more expensive guitars.

All in all, I'd recommend this guitar; great price and real value for money.

Arrived with a bridge issue, now fixed

I returned an HB-35 due to an incorrectly placed/installed bridge which didn't allow the 1st and 4th strings to intonate correctly. I was otherwise very impressed, so decided to upgrade to the plus. Unfortunately this guitar also had a similar issue - the scale length was about 1-2mm too long. Rather than send this one back too, I looked into replacement bridges with a longer saddle travel. I bought a relatively cheap Gotoh bridge (GE103B-T chrome) which slotted on perfectly, solved the intonation problem and noticeably improved the volume and tone of the guitar. I'm now very happy with my purchase!

Pros:

-Great sound - lovely warm tones and surprisingly useful coil split sounds

-Gorgeous looks. Some slight imperfections, but nothing I'm bothered about

-Great value

-Very easy to setup. I had it playing nicely in minutes.

Cons:

-The aforementioned bridge issues - I guess I was just unlucky.

-The nut is a touch high.

Overall I am very happy and have fallen in love with this guitar. I recommend the Gotoh bridge i mentioned to anyone wanting an easy upgrade to their HB-35.

Impressive

A great guitar for the price, unmatched. However my only issue, and it's a small one, is the pickups are a little too hot, i expected a more vintage sound. But it's down to personal preference :)

The only problem is quality control. When I received the guitar it required a lot of work. Fret Polishing, need to change the strings and set up. The frets were very scratchy and it took some time for me to polish them. But once I have done the work, this guitar is really nice. I am very impressed with the sound and I am in love with it.

OK

Not as good as I expected, but OK for the price. Previously received CST-24HB was in much better condition.

Pros:

Feels good, like to play it.

Finish is almost flawless.

Looks nice.

Pickups sound OK and electronics works as expected.

Tuners ares smooth.

Cons:

Fretboard is dirty.

Frets are almost unfinished, flat at top and with grinding marks, bending is hard.

Nut slot is routed at angle and nut is therefore at angle. String cavities are ok, so it will not affect string height, but looks weird.

Logo sticker is scratched and couple of millimeters off.

Scratchplate design looks bad.

I'm able to fix those issues, otherwise I'd need luthiers help.

Good for the money if you want hollow tone

The guitar is well built and paint job is superb! Its a good looking guitar!

The pickguard is poorly cut! The tuners could be better but they do the job.

Bridge and tail piece are fine! Nut is well slotted.

Tone and Volume pots work well and the push-pull is working smoothly. 3 way toggle is functioning well.

My guitar weighs 3,6kg and feels much lighter than that. Perfectly balanced when on shoulder or on the knee. Its not bottom heavy at all. One can play this without getting tired.

The pickups sound awesome in humbucker mode but not so special in single coil mode. The single coil mode sounds to me almost same as humbucker mode but with less volume. That said the humbucker mode rocks the blues all right!

The flame top on my exemplar is visdible. I know of folks receiving tops with not so much flame but mine sure has it and it looks great. Came set up very well but frets need polishing!

Things to do with a HB 35 Plus

General consideration: sound is very nice, pickups are very hot, red finish is quite nice, surface is very polished, neck comfortable, no fret buzz. For this price you cannot find something better.

Two things to do after you receive this guitar:

1. Check the surface for any defect. Sometimes it happened. If is not major...you can live with it.

2. Check the distance between 1st string and the edge of the neck. Should be the same with the gap between 6th string and edge. If is not sensible the same, send the guitar back. Fortunately I havent find any fretbuzz and also the neck was very right.

Nine things to do if you want to improve your guitar:

1. Polish the frets ( with very fine sandpaper and polish compound). The frets were not properly finished by factory so bending technique was not quite possible.

2. Evacuate the wood debris from inside acoustic chamber (mine has 2 pieces of wood inside). This in not a major issue.

3. Clean the fret board wood and oil it with lemon oil. Mine was awfully dirty and dusty!

4. Adjust string high. Use a ruler.

5. Recut the pickboard since the initial one was made awful by factory. Polish the edges at 60 degree. Try not to polish fast since the heat is destroying the resin material. You need a file, fine sandpaper and some skills. I prefer the original ES 335 shape.

6. Grease the pots.

7. Tighten the machine head. Mine was not too stabile.

8. If you have some skills you can make a new truss road. The original one is silly.

9.Adjust the tension in strings by increasing/decreasing the angle of strings over the saddles.

Tune the guitar, play and enjoy it....if you are not too tired. After these steps you'll have a very good guitar for this price.

P.S. Now I am very jealous for the new model with ivory blocks fretboard inlays.