Harley Benton R-458BK Fanfret Reviews

Excellent quality of finish. Brazilians be prepared for astronomic taxes!!!

The quality of the guitar has surprised me, better than I expected. Comfortable neck, cool design of body, and the fanned frets looks great and very easy to adapt when you came from straight parallel frets...

But the Brazilian taxes are a real stole. Have paid 276€ for guitar + shipping, and need to pay an abusive value of 299€ for Brazilian customs.... For European people, this guitar is amazing unbelievable for this price.... Buy, buy, buy, even if you only play Ramones....

Harley , my loves 8 strings

I was so looking forward to this cute guitar, when she arrived, I was just delighted, what romantic curves, elegant shapes, beautiful texture and a very pleasant instrument

Great value

Bad ass guitar for the money, just wanted to mess around with an 8 string, didnt expect much for the price, far exceeded my expectations!

Great Value 8

I had wanted to try an 8-string, and I was particularly interested to try a multi-scale guitar as well. When I saw the price of this, I checked the other reviews. Because they were overwhelmingly positive, I ordered it almost immediately. The guitar arrived very quickly, and I was blown away by the overall quality, sound, and playability of a guitar at this price point. As a platform to start exploring the extended range, this guitar does a great job. I changed the strings out to a set that has thicker bass strings, and the increased tension helps the playability there. Although the action and neck relief as the guitar arrived was certainly playable, I was able to lower the saddles a bit more without excess string buzz for even better playability. I'm eventually going to swap the stock pickups with EMGs, and the fact that the stock pickups are the same size will make this replacement job extremely easy.

Honestly, wow

I have read a lot of reviews saying "for the price this is really good" I can't help but disagree, a more accurate statement would be " if I bought this for 3 times the price, it would be really good for the price". The problems I have seen other people comment on, I haven't really experienced.

The bad: Ok the pickups are a bit rubbish so plan to change them. The tuners, yeah they hold their tune but again replacing them is probably a good idea. Also, some new strings are in order.

The good: Where to start, oh yes, the neck, its main feature, no rod adjustment needed, the smallest amount of fret leveling, only on the last couple of frets. The intonation was perfect, the action was perfect, slight adjustment on the pickup height. After these small adjustments and polishing the frets I re-stringed it and was paying with a guitar that I would have been happy to pay £500 for.

So why did I get such a cheep 8 string, I actually wanted something cheep and rubbish for try and refinish, re-hardware and setup so see how good I can make a cheep guitar, but sadly I don't think I'll get this with this, it's already at a point where I wouldn't want to change anything apart from the pickups.

Love it

Why not, let's give it a go! This guitar is an awesome introduction into 8-string guitars. Also awesome to experiment with and try some mods you always wanted to do.

I did expect I had to do a little work on this guitar, as you can expect at this price point, so I recommend to get a fret file and fret rubbers. The edges of the frets were a little sharp so I filed those and after that I polished the fret to a mirror like finish. Took about 1,5 hours.

The stock strings were a little too thin for my taste so I replaced those with an Daddario EXL140-8 set.

I own a couple of 'metal' guitars in different price ranges. The most expensive I have is about 800 euros. And I play this guitar the most at the moment. Inspiration just sparks with this guitar.

If you do a little work I think you can get this guitar the way you like.

Good Overall, Small imperfections

Body: Looks and feels good. There is no imperfections out of the box. Apparently it was polished before the shipping, there was a little polish leftover behind the neck but it was ok. It was definitely not dirty or dusty as some youtubers complained earlier.

Neck: Plays and feels nice. I like the matching headstock and the shiny Harley Benton inlay, looks like pearl. Truss rod works fine and it was adjusted with a little relief. I made it flat and it works fine. Fretboard was a little dry, but not as bad as the early reviews on youtube.

Nut: Nut is slotted ok, string depth is good but there are some material leftovers around the strings. Tuning stability isn’t good, even though the nut is a relatively hard material (NuBone as advertised on the specs) it gets out of tune after bending the strings. Probably the slots are too narrow and the strings stuck there.

Machine Heads: I love the satin black colour. Tuning gear feels a little loose, sometimes I turn the tuner heads and nothing happens. Might be an issue related with the nut. Overall, its good.

Bridge: I like the design, feels comfortable, no sharp edges, easy to adjust.

Frets: My biggest complain would be the fret finishes. Don’t worry, Its not super bad, but could be better. Even though there are no fret sprouts, sharp edges or imperfections on the surface, I can feel the roughness when I am bending the strings. Definitely needs some sanding and polishing at some time.

Pickups: I find the pickups promising. Probably better than many other mid-range guitar pickups. There are some buzzing but not too bad. I think there is a conductive paint inside, but it picks up some noise. Luckily, pickup cavity can accommodate many other 8 string pickups so its open to upgrade.

*** Overall, I wasn’t expecting this much from a guitar at this price range. I am extremely pleased to have it.

Perfecta introducción a las 8 cuerdas

Previamente había adquirido una guitarra de 7 cuerdas HB y esta ocasión pedí una de 8 y me hace pensar que la vez pasada me enviaron un B-stock porque esta guitarra no tiene defectos a comparación de la otra (espacios de cuerdas mal cortados en nut, trastes mega sucios, golpe en la parte de arriba...) así que definitivamente puedo ver la mejoría en esta, sigue siendo una guitarra ligera en mi opinión y cómoda para tocar incluso con manos pequeñas, sí evidentemente el cuello es ancho pero se siente cómodo, de nuevo la construcción y detalles mejor que la de 7 cuerdas fanfret que había pedido antes y el sonido ehh si, de nuevo las pastillas no son las mejores pero tampoco es para tanto, pedí también una sc-custom active y la ganancia de esas pastillas es tan exagerada que siento que estas dan menos lata jaja

Pretty good for a low budget 8 string

the pickups are not the greatest but when you get these pickups for 200 euros and new elixir strings on that chunky boy it`s really good

Worth the money but prepare to invest into upgrades

I was genuinely surprised in a good way that this guitar exists. For that price - it's a treasure. I mean find me a similar 8-string with that budget.

There are nuances with how it's made but nothing that breaks the experience. For example, there are cavities made for active pickups, but there are passive ones installed. There's no way to replace them with active ones as there's no battery compartment made. If you want to replace with passives - your options are limited as well because you'd have gaps that don't look pleasing. Probably the best fit here would be the Lace's Deathbar 4.0 or something similar (probably custom-made).

Pros:

-It's a multiscale guitar!

-Extremely comfortable to play

-Feels pretty solid

-Looks good

Cons:

-Stock pickups aren't good (there's like 0 clarity)

-Tuners aren't exactly bad, they do their job but I plan to replace them

-Requires extra work to improve grounding (the bridge isn't grounded because there's a layer of paint that prevents contact with a grounding wire)

In conclusion: If you're looking to buy one - be prepared to buy replacements for pickups. So some DIY skills are required. After that, you'll have a pretty solid axe without breaking a bank.

Great out of the box, even better as a project

For less than the price of a basic 6-string Squire, this guitar is amazing. If you're looking for an 8-string fanned-fret metal machine, this is seriously worth considering.

Electronics: This is the weak point, but for the price, this shouldn't be a surprise. It has dime pots and the tone control works like a switch. The neck pickup is extremely muddy with the low notes, but has a really nice round tone in the upper octave. The bridge pickup, however, is nice and bright across the whole sonic range. The switch and jack are noiseless and the soldering seems solid.

Neck: This has a shallow D neck similar to my Warwick corvette 6 string bass, which is a profile I really like. The fretwork is surprisingly nice, but not perfect. The ends are rounded and there are no sharp edges, similar to the work you find on a low-end Schecter. The frets could, however, have been polished up a little more, and I found a few that could be re-crowned. The rosewood on the fingerboard was BONE DRY when I got it and it took two applications of lemon oil to get it looking healthy and happy. The back of the neck is sealed, but not coated in lacquer--again, a choice I'm pleased with. The action was pretty good out of the box and it was 1/2 step out of tune. I like my action as low as possible, and a quick truss rod and saddle adjustment made it really easy to play. This is my first fanned-fret guitar, and I'm hooked. If it were in charge of design, I'd have left the neck free from fret markers, or done something more interesting, but the jumbo dots all on one side are fine. The strings it comes with are WAY too light for an 8 string. I put on some 11-80 NYXLs and they feel great. The nut is really sharp on the edges, but a fine file fixed that for me. Weirdly, the cuts in the nut for the low strings are not parallel to the fretboard - they are higher on the headstock side and lower on the fretboard side.

Body: It currently only comes in black and white, which is...boring. I have a white Schecter 7 string, so I opted for the all-black. The electronics cavity cover is, surprisingly, just as shiny as the body once you take the plastic off, which is a nice touch. The finish had some fine swirly scratches behind the bridge, but I plan to refinish it with color-shift paint, so I'm not worried about them. The body is quite small, thin, and light compared to my Schecter. The contours are really nice and it's no work at all to hit the 24th fret.

Final thoughts: This guitar is amazing for the money. The quality is incredible and it's nice to see that corners weren't cut with the neck, fretwork, and playability. Cheap electronics are to be expected, but they do the job and swapping them out is a relatively easy task. If you're considering an 8 string, this is a great choice.

Good budget guitar

Simple guitar, nothing special. Throw in some good pickups and it may sound great. Playability is quite good. Materials are cheap, not a surprise for this budget.

Great for trying an 8 string guitar

I wanted to try an 8 string and I had been thinking about this or Schecter Omen 8 but Schecter's price was a bit steep and scale lenght was short, so I went with this HB Fanfret.

Don't get me wrong, for the money it's a great guitar!

Sound is muddy as most other people say but nothing eq, compression or other plugin sorcery couldn't fix.

It also feels cheap (because it is cheap, duh), truss rod adjustment is wonky, tuners are really bad (like extremely bad).

All in all, if you want to see if 8 strings are for you, go ahead and buy it, you won't be disappointed.

vse prosto ahuenno

pokupkoi dovolen, zakazal 4erez ups, prishlo vse celoe zvuk horoshii, nicho ne otvalivaetsa

Nice and beauty guitar

Well balance, good weight. Excellent platform for upgrade parts. The neck is comfortable and the "Blackwood" fretboard is beautiful.

Surprisingly good gain for the coin

Bought this particular instrument as a side project, owned it for few months. Tone is very good, the hums are giving enough punch as well as highs. There was a flaw with the 1st string on the 22nd fret, which was not properly leveled (few hours in the workshop fixed this), but besides that there was nothing striking. Playability is very good, finish was almost perfect. Soon I will purchase this axe again, as I separated with the first one, sadly.

Fantastic for the price!

The guitar plays and sounds great! A fun and affordable way to get into extended range playing. It did show up with a ding at the pointy part of the headstock, and the string ferrules don't stay in the body when you change the strings. Had to file/drill out the hole in the F# tuner because it wouldn't fit the low string in the set of GHS Boomers I purchased. Other than those few small things, I'm completely satisfied and the guitar sounds better than some of my other more expensive ones. Thanks Harley Benton!

Surprisingly Good for the Price

After having the guitar for about a week. I decided to replace the strings with better ones and I concluded that I might not need to replace the pickups afterall. Most people would say the tone is muddy and compared to my EMG,s they're not so bad at all. You might need to do a bit of tweaking in your amp settings, but you can definitely get a good tone out of it as is.

I only had to do pretty minor setup to get this thing going and the fretwork is very good. No sharp ends. Reasonably low action too out of the box. One thing I might consider replacing are the tuners though, but for the price, it's a solid guitar especially for those starting out with 8 strings

it's a reasonable starter guitar

this is okay for beginning to learn how to play an 8 string guitar, and don't get me wrong it does sound pretty good for the price.

but the hum of the pickups and overall quality of the tuning heads isn't really worth it if you're looking to use this for long term use.

the tuning heads themselves go out of tune very quickly, i find myself having to re-tune the bottom string to F# quite a lot when i'm recording with this.

it is a very nice looking guitar, but just doesn't operate quite as well as i would have hoped, which should be expected of such an inexpensive product.

Fantastic deal

This guitar is perfrect for any casual guitar player wanting to travel into djent territory without breaking the bank. The fact that it is multiscale is a big plus as well.

However, if one desires to get most out of this instrument, there are a couple of things to consider. First, the guitar will definitely benefit from a visit to a luthier for proper set up upon arrival. Second, the humbucker pickups on this instrument are strictly subpar and need to be replaced if more serious applications for the guitar are considered other than casual playing. If this is done, the sound and quality ratings get +1 star instantly.