Harley Benton ST-62LH BK Vintage Series Reviews

Great bang for the buck

I am astounded at how good this guitar is for the price. Yes, I had to tighten one of the tone knobs and it could use a better setup and a little filing of the fret edges, but those issues are trivial—it sounds and plays great.

Excellent

Fantastic, strat style guitar at a great price, I was extremely surprised at the quality and sound for such a low price

Strat review

Sharp fret ends.. that's all..

Rest is excellent

Looks brilliant

Feels brilliant

Neck plays brilliantly

Tuners great

Awesome product! Very good quality for the price.

Highly recommend this product here. Since left handed guitars are more pricier than right handed guitars, it has been a struggle for me to find one on my budget range. After searching online, I have found this one and quality for the price is superb! An all around guitar for sure!

Keeping It Simple... Yet Effective!

Harley Benton is a great alternative to more expensive brands, since they don't hold off on any quality.

Very nice and comfortable guitar

This guitar is excellent especially considering the price. It is comfortable and plays well. I would recommend it for beginners.

A good surprise

I was surprised by the quality. I had made the purchase with the aim of replacing pickups and tuners but I'm going to leave things as they are.

very nice guitar for the money

the neck is nice and easy to work on it seems to stay in tune very good

love the headstock s color it is super nice i will probably never let this guitar go and i own a few from before :D

Amazing guitar for 155€

Well the righthanded version is 20€ less but thats the pain of being a lefty. Its my first electric guitar and I only played classical before. So I still need some time to adjust to the thinner neck haha.

Overall, the build quality is amazing. the hardware is alright, it feels cheap but its definitely doing its job. I didnt notice any rough frets, everything is pretty smooth. The pickguard is very easy to scratch but it came with a membrane. I loved the woods, they dont look cheap at all. The finish didnt have any marks. Im just amazed how everything is perfect.

The fretboard is a little rough though but got used to it after a day or so. The tuners do hold the tune very well, havent used the tremolo yet. I dont know if the pickups are good or not as Im not an expert but they do their job for me. Depends on your amp too.

If you are looking to start playing but dont want to completely cheap out, this feels like an amazing option, considering you want a st like guitar. This feels like a guitar Id play forever.

I have given this guitar full marks with consideration to the price point that it is offered at. I purchased this guitar for my father to learn with and sent it to my address to give it a cursory setup before he took it; not needed, the guitar was well setup, moderately high action not to my taste but fine for a beginner. Scratchy frets which can be easily polished if you feel bothered by it, or they smooth themselves out with bending the strings over time. These budget guitars are not the ones that I learned with 15 years ago and the only shame is that this one is left handed so I couldnt fully play it myself ;)

Impressive

Perhaps not the very best Strat type available, but in my personal opinion, once set up properly my Harley Benton ST-62 BK lefty now feels and plays far better than it should for just over £100!!! In a blind test I don't think there is much between my Player Stratocaster MIM (made in Mexico) costing £300 second hand). Playing on stage I would settle for either.

Harley Benton have really upped their game over the last few years.

If you are thinking of getting a Strat in your armoury you should give the ST-62 some real consideration - unless, of course, you are hung up on what is written on the headstock.

Harley Benton deliver yet again

Where to begin?

I bought this guitar as I wanted to gauge whether or not I was ready to get back into classic strat style guitars, without jumping straight in at the deep end with the Fender USA Professional II I'd been eyeing. Normally I play a Harley Benton Fusion II, having abandoned my other high-end axes in favour of Harley Benton products owing to their superior feature set and sounds.

Needless to say, I've not been disappointed by the ST-62. As with the rest of Harley Benton's lineup (with the exception of the most basic entry-level products), quality is excellent, and straight-up astounding considering the price.

First up, lets begin with fit and finish - I've had high-end and intermediate guitars from big manufacturers that had far greater shortcomings out of the box compared to this guitar. The frets have been very nicely cut - at no point do they jut out of the sides of the fretboard. Obviously for the money you're paying, they'll need polishing and levelling to maximise the potential of the guitar, but overall, not bad. The neck itself feels very premium with a smooth satin finish not unlike that of the Fusion II. In fact the neck profile deserves specific mention here because it isn't what you'd expect on a guitar implying 1962 strat - it's essentially a Telecaster neck (thick!), but with a very flat radius - an odd choice, but I like it. No trouble bending here.

It's all well put together - the pots and jack are all nice and solid on my guitar. No loose connections or rattle. The neck and action needed an adjustment and my guitar came fitted with .10-.46 strings, so the nut might need a minor adjustment or lubrication to minimise binding. That being said, I haven't really encountered any tuning difficulties during normal playing (and bend quite a lot, and it holds up well even with compound bends).

The pickups installed in the guitar are great. I'm a fan of Roswell's lineup and learned previously that they will go head-to-head with DiMarzios or Seymour Duncans and come out holding their own. On my Fusion II I briefly replaced the stock pickups but instantly put them back because the Tone Zone and Air Norton I'd fitted ruined the balance between the many positions and didn't sound better individually either. That was a lesson learned.

Anyway I'd watched MANY videos online with "blind tests" of the ST-62 being compared to US strats, Xotic guitars etc - and time and time again I'd find out my favourite sounding one was the ST-62. This speaks volumes.

In practise they are responsive and have that shimmering quality single coils are known for. Definitely no need to replace these.

Elsewhere we have the Kluson-style tuners, which are pretty stable. I think the string trees maybe can be replaced with ones that will bind less, and the bridge unit could be of a higher quality in terms of metal, but I don't get the impression the guitar is being robbed of tone anywhere.

All in all, in 2021 we are a far cry from the Squier Affinity I first got over 20 years ago when I'd started - and even that was head-and-shoulders above the strat copies circulating during the 80's and 90's.

For those who are looking for a Strat-style guitar without breaking the bank, look no further, Harley Benton has you covered (as usual!)

Amazing Guitar

This is an outstanding value for the money. I was sceptical before I purchased the guitar, but now that I've had it in my hands, I couldn't be happier. There are no fret sprouts whatsoever, the guitar is perfectly intonated, there is not a single scratch on the guitar, the frets and the fretboard are perfect ( I might eventually polish the frets and oil the fretboard, but this is not something that needs to be done ASAP ), there is not a single dead note on the entire fretboard, the roswell pickups are of good quality, they sound great both clean and can handle high gain tone. The nut is cut perfectly. There really isn't any flaw on this guitar that I could find. Unreal.

OK for the money

Pluses, sounds good (nice single coil squeal), stays in tune pretty well. Minuses, Very rough frets and the claw that holds the bridge is mounted so far off center that you can't fit a spring on the outside of the claw. It does look nice and play okay overall.

basic strat

bought this to have the strat ive never really liked them but know there is that strat sound,when i got this it had rusted strings on it and scratches on the scratch plate but for the price what can you expect ive changed strings and set it up plays ok but im spoiled having Gibsons and PRS guitars already it wont stop me buying any other harley benton guitars in future service department and contacts are good to deal with

I am only a hobby guitarist but have in collection Gibson’s and fenders but I also have epiphones he Harley Bentons have always exceeded my expectations and this st62 plays as good if not better than most of my collection and on top off this is the price I don’t know how they can sell them for the price that they do but I am glad that they do

What an awesome Guitar for Lefty's!

I am a new player, I bought a Fender Squire Telecaster at the suggestion of a local shop, It's fine...I just didn't fall in love with it. Then I saw some reviews on Harley Bentons that were very positive on Youtube so I ended up here. First off, I can't believe now that I have the guitar in my hand that it was so inexpensive even delivered to the US, I really enjoy playing this Guitar! I'm new so I don't have tons of experience but I do know this Guitar "Feels" right, no other way to explain it. I pick this guitar up every time, I will probably sell the Squire and get another HB, one thing that others have mentioned is the flatter fret board, it makes playing so much smoother for me. The only thing is the frets were a little rough, I smoothed then down with some fine grade sandpaper and now it's smooth. I would buy it again in a minute and will tell anyone who asks...Buy one, you won't regret it.

Nice S type

Here is a well-made Strat type guitar with vintage-y looks coupled with a flat radius fingerboard preferred by shredders but not an old teenager like me.

Sounds good, plays good. No issues here.

Much lighter and much more comfortable to play than the Tele type Harley Bentons. The latter are almost always too heavy even though they're indicated to be built with basswood which is supposed to be a light wood. Go figure. (Same issue with the modern Hagstrom basses which are also made with basswood. Heavier than you'd expect.)

Great inexpensive guitars if you can stand that volume knob right by the strings which impedes your picking/strumming hand. I always remove and relocate the volume knob on Strats. Even if you're as good as Jimi Hendrix, you simply cannot palm mute and play closer to the bridge with that knob getting in your way.

OUTSTANDING

surpassed my expecations,the finish and feel to this guitar is something i did not expect arrived in uk three days after hassle free ordering,plays beautifully straight out of the box,i have owned several brands over guitars over 30 years and being left handed youre limited as bob dylan said "dont think twice its allright". im saving for more of these beauties