Harley Benton SC-450Plus VB Vintage Series 3-stars Reviews

good for that value

Out of the box in gemeralnot playable until alot of fretwork done to eliminate buzzing the magnets are good but not the pontesiometers tunning keys are just ok.I have chnge everything except the wood part witch haw a very good paint job .Overall for that money if you are a handson person its a beautifull instrument.

Good sound but terrible craftsmanship

I had heard very good things about this guitar on youtube and through the reviews but I am positively dissapointed.

Although the guitar has a great tone there is a lot of work to be done of it in order that I can have fun playing it and keep wanting to pick up. For now my Yamaha pacifica V212 gets the upper hand every time because of the fact that:

* It's intonationed properly.

* The frets are correctly leveled.

* Low action and easy to play

All of these things are missing on the Harley Benton SC-450.

Negatives:

When I first got it out of the box, the pickup switches plate immediately fell off. I thought, alright, not a good sign but easy fix, and screwed it back on.

There is also a slight twist in the neck, it's not very much (not as bad as my Harley Benton ST-62 which I decided to send back, I'm still undecided on this one) but it's there.

The guitar is not intonated properly, and there are a lot of uneven frets that need leveling.

One of the pickups are not properly mounted and moves around if you touch it.

Positive:

This guitar has decently low action .

I really like having the option to coil split, just for the fun of it.

It sounds good and is was very fun to play until the faults become too much to overlook.

I don't recommend getting this guitar unless you are ready to put extra time into correcting the mistakes made in production. It's very unfortunate because the price of getting it fixed by a luthier is as much, if not more than what the guitar costs. There is atleast 2-3 hours worth of work needed on this guitar for it be playable, which is very sad considering that someone took the pride to put a tag with their name on it on this guitar (I wish I had kept it so I could put his name here, because he really did a terrible job on both my HB guitars).

But if this is what you want, I would recommend this guitar. Otherwise, be very strict in your notes when you order it of how you want it setup and perhaps they will do it to save the pain of having another guitar sent back.

Buzzing frets

Buzzing frets in many positions and strings. I can hear the undesirable noise even with the combo. Otherwise the quality of the materials is good.

My first guitar

bought a guitar a few weeks ago.

сracked fretboard.

Not bad for the money

Keeping in mind that this guitar costs less than £150, it's not bad. The pickups are a little muddy sounding, and the coil tap barely makes a difference to the sound. The switch and pots all needed tightening on my copy when it arrived. The tuning pegs have that vintage look, but they are not accurate enough, so tuning can be pain. The neck is ok, although it has a flat radius that takes some getting used to. Also has a lot of finger noise from the fretboard, almost as if the neck is hollow. On the plus side, it's well finished, and a reasonable weight, although nothing like a real Les Paul. There's a lot of things that bug me about it, but considering it's half the price of even an Epiphone, it's really not too bad.

04/30/20 Update: So, since the purchase, I've discovered a few other issues with the guitar. First, the coil tap in the bridge pickup wasn't connected, so it was permanently in Humbucker mode. Easy fix, but annoying. Then both(!) strap pins fell out and had to be shimmed and glued in. Next, one of the bushings on the posts for the tailpiece fell out while I was restringing the guitar. The hole for it was far too big, so again it had to be shimmed. I'd still rate the overall quality as OKAY, but the quality control on these is AWFUL. You might get a good one, you might get a dog.

I will divide this review in pros and cons to help the process.

Pros:

-Affordable

-Good wood quality, hardware and nice appearance

-Descent sound for the price

-Tuning is stable

Cons:

-The fretboard was as dry it can get

-One of the tuning keys it feels like stuck and its difficult to tune

-The fretboard is not as wide as I would like to feel comfortable. Its not a big problem, maybe 2-3 mm.

Overall a fun guitar to play.