Harley Benton TE-52 NA LH Vintage Series 5-stars Reviews

Thanks for the nice guitar

I bought this for a left-handed performance. A great degree of perfection and beautiful guitar arrived. It is a little heavy because of the nature of wood. But it's perfect in everything else. It's not easy to find a left-handed guitar with the design you want. In the meantime, I decided to buy it after seeing many kinds of guitars sold here. Certainly this time I bought a guitar at a low price on trial. However, despite being a country in Asia, I was able to receive it in only two weeks and am satisfied with the service. I'm thinking of buying another guitar next time.

I hope your business thrives.

Astoniishing guitar!

Fantastic guitar. Worth every penny. And you it won't cost you many! As with ALL Harley Bentons I've had so far, it came set up well. The only, perhaps, downsides are the weight, as it is heavy, and the tuners - but it plays great, stays in tune, intonates really well, sounds like a really great Tele...and the (chunky) next is just fabulous.

Just a great guitar and it costs so little. Super stuff.

Second of the same

I’ve just received my second TE 52 which I had delivery to Spain and true to form is is as good as the other one I have in the UK the setup is very good with only a good tuning required as I’ve said before I can’t believe how they sell them for this price ( the one big criticism is that they don’t make enough models in lefthand ) but on a positive level it keeps my wife off my back from buying more Harley Bentons

most "authentic" Tele for the money

vintage features and looks - good sound

I play strats and I needed a Tele to try. In this price has all the goodies. Ashtray bridge (string through- - unusual for a cheap instrument) with 3 saddles, Alnico magnets with base plate and vintage style tuners. The neck is on the thick side very nice feeling and the radius is modern (definitely not 7.5).

The quality is good, frets were ok the finish is nice although is more dark (not that intense) than a traditional natural Tele finish. I don't like the knobs much, are plastic (but it's easy to replace them).

The only downside on this instrument is the heavy body. It is ash but on the heavy side. So if you want to play alt rock and and jump on the stage (song 2...) maybe is not the perfect choice. But remember, there are Teles from the 70's that heavy.

As for the sound, I don't have much experience in Teles, the bridge has the twang, the sustain is excellent.

I think this is the perfect ticket to enter Tele world. All the key factors of the original are here. For rockabilly, country players is an ideal instrument.

Looks, sounds and plays amazing with some cheap mods

I could not believe how great it looked when I took it out of the box, there were no visible flaws, looks much better in the flesh. The neck has a great feel to it. The pickups are great, I thought that would be a definite mod - the tone is pure tele, even the tuning pegs are passable, they hold their tune and look great, however I may change them for higher quality ones. It’s quite heavy, but I personally prefer that. The pots a smooth and nicely weighted.

The only real negative is that the cavities do not have any form of shielding. All single coil pickups, unless you buy noiseless ones are noisy, especially with high gain. There are loads of YouTube videos that teach you how to shield the cavities to greatly reduce the noise. I purchased two A4 sheets of copper self adhesive shielding for £8.00 and followed instruction carefully on a hand picked YouTube tutorial from an expert - you need to do some soldering and adding earth wires to the pots And output jack, but the rest if the work is quite easy. I also tightly twisted the hot and earth wires from the pickups and to the output jack, this also reduces the hum. When completing this task I was amazed at the difference, it virtually got rid of any hum, the difference was literally night & day - I would defiantly recommend this mod. The only other thing I did was to file the fret ends and polish up the frets, which were quite scratchy, this is quite normal for a cheap guitar, but easy to rectify yourself - again there are loads of top luthiers that show you how to this on YouTube. It’s worth taking your time doing this and after filing, use varying grades of sandpaper for smoothing the fret ends only, doing so will make the fret ends ultra smooth, just like on any high end guitar. To finish the frets, I used an automotive metal paste polish to shine them up. The frets now are super smooth and shinny. This guitar is a no brainer, even if you are a skilled pro player, with a few cheap mods you can have a quality tele costing over 10 to 15 times than the cost of the HB, even with the mods.

I also purchased some brass saddles, they are supposed to give you more sustain, but to be honest I did not see a great difference, so the stock ones will still be OK, but I do like the look of the brass ones, another cheap mod, about £7.00 for a left handed set too.

Great Tele very well made

would buy again fantastic value great quality

It's great!

I realize that from name to style, the obvious comparison is Fender/Squire- but I think a pound-for-pound comparison is made with the ESP LTD TE-254. On that comparison, the TE-52 NA is a better value-for-money. If I were to drop in a humbucker at the neck, and replace the saddles , it'd be an exact match at about 150 less. So, if you, like me, love a T style, but want a flatter radius, and a bit more "rocknroll attitude" this is an obvious choice.

Even better than expected

So I already own the leftie CST24T and Harley Benton's jazz bass copy, both of which I love. I'd been looking for a Tele style for a while for my country band and the TE-52 looked just right.

I'd read some mixed reviews, but based on my experience so far with HB guitars I thought I'd give it a shot. Boy, was that a good idea!

First, the only niggles ... the frets needed a polish, and the strings were shot. The but was cut too high. And that's all! The nut popped right out and was filled down in 15 minutes. The frets polished up fine, and the strings were replaced.

Now the good stuff.

Unlike others I've seen, my TE-52 is made from just two pieces of wood for the body (beautifully matched) and to for the neck. No extra bits stuck here and there ... it looks amazing. The neck is hefty but not uncomfortable and the hardware was all in top condition. No sharp edges on the tuners, electronics work perfecty, scratchplate cut smoothly and accurately.

The sound is exactly what I was looking for. A bridge pickup that's bright but not harsh, with some nice meat to it, and a warm neck pickup. Tuning stability is rock solid.

This is my third HB guitar ... but it will not be my last!

Fantastic Tele for the money

Firstly Im a drummer not a guitarist, but I have owned several more expensive guitars and been surrounded by guitars most of my life.

Delivery was spot on - 3 days from Germany to UK, well packed and good communication.

The guitar is very well made, no obvious blemishes, apart from a little tarnish on the strings but they do sound fine to me.

The guitar is well packed internally but covered in sticky back plastic which is tricky to get off but no big deal.

The body is lovely gloss, the matt neck is straight, frets are well finished at the ends just a little rough on the surface - and easily fixed in 5 mins.

Hardware on the whole seems fine, controls all in order, tuners are not the best in the world, but this is a budget guitar and it does stay in tune.

Wilkinson pick-ups sound great to me - just the way a Tele should.

Im very happy with this guitar and I feel it is worth every penny - and probably quite a bit more!

If you want the quality of a true Fender then this is not the guitar for you - but at £120, I doubt you will find a better guitar.

A deserved upgrade...

This is the second TE-52 NA LH I've bought, having very regretfully sold the first one I bought (review below). Big mistake. The very fact that I've bought a replacement is testament to just how good a guitar this is. The build quality is excellent, and the rest - well, here's my original review:

I write this review with the price firmly in mind. I was looking for a rhythm guitar, and having bought the outstanding CST-24T, I decided to give the Harley Benton TE-52 a go. At around £115, I didn't think I could go far wrong. When it arrived I was knocked out - this truly is a great looking Telecaster copy, with a really lovely finish. I expected a little setting up would be required; however, I decided that I'd simply tune it first and give it a try. The action was a little too low but the intonation was pretty good. But the first time I did a string bend, well... The string grated horrible across the fret, as did any bend in any position. The fret ends were finished well, but the top surfaces were a bit rough. I am going to set the guitar up and fit heavy gauge strings, but I will have to deal with the frets first, which is a little disappointing considering the quality of the CST-24T I bought. However, when considering the price, this Telecaster copy really is a great guitar and is highly recommended."

I have to say, I'm upgrading my review to 5 stars. I polished the frets and set the guitar up. And now, well, I just love it. I can't put it down.

And as I said last time: all I can say is, just get one. You will not regret it.

Brilliant Tele for the money

Brillant guitar for the money. It needed a little work on the neck, nut far too high, frets needed a good polish and the bridge height and intonation needed some adjustment, but the work was well worth it. The finish is spot on and the Wilkinson pickups give a true tele sound.

Its the second Harley Benton guitar Ive bought and Im really pleased with both.

Thoroughly recommend this brand for quality and tone.

real tele sound

this guitar sounds awesome build quality too.

bad picture

trust me the photograph of this guitar does not represent the real thing its not a caramel colour its blonder like you expect and no swirly wood grain,i appreciate they differ but honestly the photo doesnt do it justice. the neck has a satin finish it played beautifully straight from the box. three days to arrive to u.k from time of order only gripe strings rusty but im a leftie and thats the least of my worries,im now saving for more