Harley Benton RB-600BK Classic Series Reviews

Nice guitar but.....

I received the guitar only with a day of delay. The instrument looks really nice but unfortunately the bridge is quite completely unscrewed. They labeled the guitar as "inspected" before shipping.... I wonder what they inspected...... More money to have it set from a professional luthier....

Super!

Do not expect anything extraordinary from this guitar (except for its look of course). I was therefore slightly disappointed with the RB-600BK. There are no obviously major flaws with it, but overall it's not of the same high standard as my other Harley Benton guitars. We All Know that Pickups, Strings Machine Heads Knobs ETC. Can be improved so Go And Spend 3 Grand Then.Straight out of the box the Action was very good, But I did tweak it a little as I like really Low Action.

HB RK600BK

Nice playing guitar. The only problem is the pickup selector switch will not engage both pickups at the same time.

A great guitar for the price

I ordered this guitar with minimal expectations. Usually, when you order something this inexpensive, you plan to do a little work to get it up to your own playing standards. In this case, however, I was pleasantly surprised. I read the other reviews and took note of some of the complaints early on, and it appears they’ve been address quite well. The neck is like a thin C-shape, the frets are dressed and rolled superbly, and the action is nice and low without any fret buzz. And the sound…these pickups are really nice!

All-in-all, a great little guitar for the price. If this is how they always come, I’ll be ordering more very soon!

Perfect out of the box, just needed minimal tuning and stretching

Being the only €200 lookalike based on a range of €4000 guitars, I didn't expect much. I was pleasantly surprised. It performs excellently as a hollow-body guitar and has a twang that reminds one of early Beatles.

Far Exceeds My Expectation!!!

This guitar, Harley-Benton RB600BK is a fantastic electric guitar, and at an unbelievable price! Even with the rapid shipping cost to USA, this is a guitar player's dream.

Good for its price

Do not expect anything extraordinary from this guitar (except for its look of course). However it is quite good for its price. The main advantage of it are its classic rick-like look and weight. In terms of tone it is quite universal with satisfactory clean tone and well sounding distorted. As for disadvantages: a weird construction of bridge - be careful while replacing strings, do not remove all strings at once, otherwise you may spend hours to discover how the bridge was originally set. The string tension is the only thing to hold it in its proper place (as far as I know it's a feature of original rick-o-matics). The quality of its assembly isn't immaculate but satisfactory hence it is better to do some adjustments (strings' and pickup height) after purchasing

Rick on a Stick

Bought for my girlf (her daughter has a real Rick ) fr shorter scale ...£2000 difference ...NO great looking fun player .......good for rhytmn players ....no one plays lead on top spec Ricks

Love it

Love this guitar. Firstly though I'm no expert; I'm 61, was widowed last year and also retired due to health reasons so decided to revisit my youth and pick up my guitar again after a long hiatus. At that stage I just had the one guitar (an excellent Epiphone dot) and now I have fourteen, this is one of my favourites. I can't get into techie details because I'm not qualified to but imho it looks amazing, it sounds amazing and was totally playable out of the box. Extremely happy with it, so much so that I might buy a sunbuest one next.

Better than a Rickenbacker 325 C64...

..Not better, but it is quite easily on par with it. Mine arrived from Germany to California within a week shipped UPS. No major issues with transport: though the RickOmatic was slightly askew, so a little adjustment there was required: There was some buzzing going on with the 6th string, and that cured the issue straightaway. No intonation issues at all to speak of. The neck is perfectly straight without any need of trussed adjustment. The frets are buttery smooth--unlike the sprout issues found in some other reviews. No major visual spots to be seen inside the f hole...it looks like there is some extra lacquer in there, though. Tuners are WAY better than I imagined!! Day one: I beat the crap out of it with a few early Beatles, and it stayed in tune 100% perfectly! The only thing that bugged me was some shrink-wrap under the filtertrons that I can't remove cleanly due to it being under the pickups support plate. That's just a minor visual issue anyway.

Straightaway, This guitar is a stunning value for the money...

For about 14% the cost of a 4K Ripoff-enbacker the Harley Benton RB 600BK is a major score. It looks stunning, The Lennon vibe is there. BTW: this guitar has no issues going through customs because it is not pretending to be an illegal. junky pirated copy.

An amazing guitar, even it it cost more!

I ordered this guitar for myself during the 2020 holiday season. After playing it every day since it arrived, I thought now would be a good time to give my comments. First of all, the quality of the finish was flawless. No random spray painting into the f-hole, no poorly glued bindings, the neck is straight, the frets feel good. I play a lot of blues, so bending is important and it feels great. String height was, and is, just the way I like it. The tuners are basic but they work well. the guitar stays in tune while playing and then the next day when I retune, it is practically spot on perfect. The guitar has a very nice tone and I like the performance of the Artec Filtertrons. It is a beautiful guitar, it is very playable. I hear some people say that it feels small, but I don't think so. I am 183cm and 100 kilos and it doesn't feel too small. Sure, is it smaller than my Wildcat? Yes. Is it smaller than my Les Paul? A little. But the pluses for me are amazing. The weight is good, not too heavy. All in all, I think that anyone who wants a Ricky inspired guitar should go for it and buy this guitar.

excellent sound, build quality and appearance-at the highest level!

Can't Stop Playing This Thing

I had watched a few review videos on YouTube and was expecting a few things: 1) paint in the f-hole, 2) finish imperfections and 3) general quality control issues. I opened the box and found absolutely none of these. It was playable out of the box: frets were great, action good, just a beautiful guitar.

I can't put it down. I've been playing early beatles songs for 3 hours now. I think I played Please Please Me about ten times.

The guitar sounds great and is easily playable. The only con I could think of is due to the nature of the guitar - it's a small scale and for a big guy like me it takes a bit of getting used to. I'm past that point and really digging this thing!

Awesome Guitar

Excellent quality guitar, great price, great retro look and sound, very impressed, highly recommended!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good quality guitar

Not a bad guitar for a little money. Good sound. Normal build quality. It looks much better in real life than in photos. Very happy with the purchase.

Stop Nit Picking Guys

We All Know that Pickups, Strings Machine Heads Knobs ETC. Can be improved so Go And Spend 3 Grand Then. and there will be something you don't like on that one either. Trust me I know , That's the way Guitars are we are all different people with different Tastes in things. some people like low action others High, some people like a chunky neck, others don't, All im saying is for the money guys you cant beat it. If you have a few skills in setting a guitar up then theres no problem ive been playing guitar for 40 years I Bought this for Home use Only In My Studio and was very impressed. Straight out of the box the Action was very good, But I did tweak it a little as I like really Low Action. Id like to see a Smaller Neck some Day on these Guitars about a 40mm Nut with a Softer C Shape profile ( That's just my preference ) The Quality of the build of the guitar was Insanely Fantastic Overall for me Just Fantastic for the money

disgraceful

was going to use this for professional band purposes, but the quality control was so bad that it's not usable. I wouldn't even sit around my house and play this thing. Tuners slip, Nut was gnarled and crooked, Pickups sound like complete crap, and there is a sheet of glue on the inside of the F hole of the guitar.

Maybe pass on this one

I own 3 other Harley Benton guitars: CST-24, XT-22 and TE-70RW deluxe. All of these 3 guitars are superb value for money and surprisingly high quality fit, finish, playability and tone.

I was therefore slightly disappointed with the RB-600BK. There are no obviously major flaws with it, but overall it's not of the same high standard as my other Harley Benton guitars. The tuning machines are wobbly and have quite a lot of slack. The nut was cut a bit too high making intonation and action adjustment difficult. The fretboard is rough and very dry. The frets were a bit scratched and corroded. The pickups were quite microphonic, especially the bridge pickup which squeals at gig volume. The bridge saddles have evidence of corrosion on them. The bridge was not mounted flush or level. The inside of the body behind the F hole is splattered with glue and paint. One of the knobs broke off when I pulled it to take a look at the pots.

I was able to address these issues, and have now got the guitar up to a reasonable playing standard, but based on my experience, I would pass on this particular Harley Benton model. I do own a genuine Rickenbacker among my other guitars, and I appreciate that the HB model is only 1/10th of the price of the comparable USA made Ricky, but you'd struggle with this guitar unless you have some basic luthier skills required to get it up to the necessary standard for playability.

RB-600BK compares favorably with Rickenbacker 325C64

Today I received my Harley Benton RB-600BK. Last week I got a Rickenbacker 325C64, so I was able to compare the two side by side.

I am amazed and delighted with the RB-600; it sounds quite similar to the 325C64. The RB-600 is just a bit brighter, but rolling off some treble gives one a very close approximation of that classic Ricky sound. The action and intonation were very good right out of the box; impressive for a guitar that was shipped from Germany to California.

For a guitar that costs less than a tenth of the 325C64, to say that I am most impressed would be an understatement! I will be ordering the Harley Benton RB-612CS 12-string very soon.

Fine for the money!

Looks cool, cheap as chips, playable but will need work to satisfy an intermediate/pro player.

Pros: Good looking tribute to Rickenbacker style,

very affordable, compact sized semi acoustic.

Cons: Finish had some flaws, also a little damage to the tailpiece, Bridge pick up doesn't sound great (I've replaced already), Neck pick up sounds good to me. Frets needed levelling and dressing, but I'd expect that on a sub £200 guitar. It also seemed to me the bridge was too narrow, so the strings didn't follow the line of the neck as it gets wider from nut to bridge. I've filed new string slots in the existing saddles to correct that.

I always intended to to do some tinkering with this guitar, so I'm not unhappy with it - most guitars need a little setting up, even at twice this price, so having to do a little more to get it playing and sounding spot on is fine by me.