Harley Benton MS-60 VW Vintage Series Reviews

Mental for the money!

This is a gorgeous little guitar. I bought it because I couldn't afford a Mustang. The strings were a little high in the nut but 10 mins with a set of Oxy-acetylene torch cleaning files (£2.50, Ebay)) sorted this and 5 mins with a file on the Whammy bar internals transformed it from a super little guitar to an amazing little guitar. I own 4 Harley Benton's and am blown away by all of them. Great materials and quality. I think the prices are so inexpensive because of the limited amount of actual human involvement in the set-up. You might be lucky and get a 100% one straight from the box but a bit of research and an hour spent fine tuning is so well worth it.

Great little guitar

This is a great project guitar. Finish and build is very good. The hardware is good and even the pickups sound good. I recommend this for anyone as a great value.

I took this guitar and replaced the vibrato (Fender American standard vibrato), pickups (with Seymore Duncan affinity). The guitar now sounds and plays awesome now.

great guitar

Ive been a fender fan most of my life. I was very surprised right out of the box. No improvements needed.

great mustang shape guitar

this is very cool small guitar, i love it

Cons: noisy pickups but interesting sound, loose tuners, trouble with is the E, at unboxing E blown away

Pros: great shape, frets were leveled nice, no buzzing, nice ergonomic, nice tremolo

great guitar

got this and had to work on the nut a little bit, but apart from that, great guitar. looks like a mustang but with a twist. pickups are too bright , but a swap would help.

My first electric guitar

I bought this guitar because three singles are too much for me. Great price, good quality.

Pros:

- Sounds good

- Good quality finish

Cons:

- Tuners not the best

All in all a very nice guitar for a very low price.

Nice little guitar

Harley Benton have really delivered the goods here, purely on lòoks alone it wins already straight out of the box.

If you have no experience of short scales and quirky bridge/tremolo systems then expect to do some on the job learning before you get it set up well. That is not a criticism of this particular model but any guitar with these features. If that scares you then check out the st or te range of Harley Benton guitars.

If you must have a 'stang and are prepared for the regular quirks then go right ahead and grab one of these. Because after a simple setup it really is a lovely guitar that has a really authentic feel.

Plugged in sound, firstly went through a Fender Champion and I had intended to replace the pickups...then I put it through a valve amp and changed my mind very quickly.

It sounds great for a number of styles from rock'n'roll to Nirvana to atmospheric doodling. It seemed to come to life through an amp with tonal character, I would say it has a more jag like tone than 'stang like...but no complaints there.

Will be grabbing a lefty version as soon as they are in stock.

Excellent 24” scale Mustang Inspired Guitar

The Harley Benton MS-60 is an Excellent 24” scale Mustang inspired guitar. It’s more beautiful in person than what the photos reveal. It’s short scale makes it very easy to play and it sounds amazing,

Good but needed a complete setup

This was my first Harley Benton and i was very dissapointed with the setup, there was major fret buzz nearly everywhere on the frets. It took me about 3 hours to set it up correctly so their QC really needs to be checked. Tuners are decent but they do need replacing as they kept slipping even after 4 days of use.

Anyway enough of the bad here is the good sort of.

Once it was setup it is a great guitar for the money. It really looks vintage too with the ivory colour. The sound has a 70's vibe to it which i love. It feels very easy to play not the best but good.

Overall a great value guitar. All though you need to spend a bit more getting a decent setup and better tuners. but for the price it can't be beat. I will be buying another HB for sure.

Nice jangly sound guitar

I bought this to see if I wanted a wiry jangly sound. It does all that but I found it a bit too suble for my Tele, Strat, Les Paul 335 style of playing. The trem works fine and it has a very light action and in the right hands would do a good Indie type performance. I sold it for little less than I paid for it. It looked and sounded the part and now has a more appreciative owner!

Excellent Mustang style guitar

Good balanced feel, neck is smooth and comfortable, and the tremolo system works a lot better than expected for a budget guitar, especially considering the general design has known issues even on high end guitars. All in all, an excellent beginner guitar and a great platform for mods for more experienced players.

For the Price!

It's not a high quality instrument but it will easily rival other instruments of its type that are 3x the price. If you've already got a "main" guitar but want a mustang type guitar to add that sound to your tool kit, this is an excellent option, can't be beaten on bang for buck! It's especially a good buy if you like modding instruments.

It could do with:

better tuners

better nut

the Whammy bar is too long and using it and strumming/picking at the same time, comfortably, means you're strumming/picking almost at the 15th fret.

rolled finger board

The bridge is a bit "sticky" when you're using the whammy bar, not the smoothest movement, easy fix tho without replacing the bridge.

What it probably doesn't need:

Frets are pretty well done

The pickups are great! genuine mustang sound. well matched, lots of detail in the sound.

Harley Benton MS-60

The guitar arrived from Germany in 9-10 days. The ONLY reason I didn't give this guitar a full Five Star Review is because the Tremelo arm falls out easily. It's a push in type, so I have to push hard to keep it in. Other than that, Fit, Finish, Sound, and Playability are ALL Top shelf. Just a slight truss rod and height adjustment to the bridge was all that was necessary to get it to play like a Champ, which is great considering how many different zones it traveled through to get here. After letting it settle in for a few days I made minor adjustments to the intonation. It's a superb Instrument

Bang for the buck

Lost the whammy bar sadly, but I still love this guitar. The guitar flew in all set up ready to go. Fell in love with the short-scaleness!

The bridge pickup output is noticeably lower than the neck's output, which I'd say could be a downside. The fret edges could also be smoother, but hey, it can't be all perfect!

If you're still going back and forth about whether or not to buy this guitar, just order it and think later – that would be my advice!

This is an excellent guitar. The quality is excellent I didn't find any disadvantages.

Nice vintage guitar- the best one for its price

Hi guys! I've finally got this beautiful instrument and really want to share my happiness with you =)

Pros:

- A very nice freatboard, no frets stiking out

- Solid tuners, I'm impressed

- Neck pickup sounds warm and the bridge one is like a glass

Cons:

- pickups sound is rather quiet, will fix it with amp volume =)

- the bridge is really hard, not going to use it anyway

- pickups are a little bit noisy but they are singles so it's fine

Overall MS-60 is a great guitar. It can be used right from the box. No addtitonal fixes needed. I'd like to replace bridge pickup with another one in future but no rush for it.

The color of the guitar is not white as on a picture. It's lemon but I think it's even better - a true vintage look.

I'm going to use this guitar playing with my rock'n'roll band. Hope I could play it even during conserts.

Surprising

This guitar surprised me as I was not expecting such quality for the money I spent. I mostly play blues and the MS-60 can keep up quite comfortably. Pick-ups are superb, it keeps the tuning for ages and the feel of it is that of a more expensive axe. It also looks the part.

Very recommended.

Pickup heights

This is an excellent guitar, apart from the pickup heights. The neck (on mine anyway) is very high above the body. Because of this the pickups at their highest setting is around 3/4" - 1.00" away from the strings. I like them adjusted so they "punch" and control the treble/ bass response. Because I cannot get them close to the strings overall the guitar sounds like a rhythm guitar, used for chords only. Apart from that...... excellent!!!!

don't bother

Nut slots do not line up with the tuners. High action with fret buzz. A fantastic Chinese guitar, you will spend more time sorting it out than playing it. went from the box to the dust bin within a week. No one should have to deal with this!

Fabulous

What a lovely, 'small' guitar! When it arrived, within two days to the Netherlands, and unpacked..i felt that quit some fret-edges where kinda sharp . That was easely corrected with Göldo Fret Polishing Rubber...works great...the rest of this guitar is marvelous...intonation was almost spot on..build quality is very good...and it is so much fun to play...i love the slim neck...the little bit smaller space between the frets fits my hands...the pickups sound very alright! It plays light and slick....it keeps it's tuning.My second Harley Benton electric guitar is a hit aswell! Love it!!!