Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit DC Style

I am a home player and enjoy learning and playing different styles. I've had a few electrics over the years, currently own a couple of decent mid-range guitars. I bought this kit as I wanted something different and to put my own mark on it - it was also a 'lockdown' project to keep me busy!

Arrived very well packaged. I immediately ignored all instructions and focussed on working on the body. My objective was a natural type finish, not too glossy, so I went with Tru-oil. Youtube vids were helpful, it took a lot of sanding over many days and I am really pleased with how it looks. The body is obviously constructed out of pieces, so it was never going to look totally amazing, but I am very happy with it and the graining does look nice. Tru-oil does not darken the wood a great deal, so with hindsight I might have lightly stained it too before Tru-oiling, maybe I'll do that on my next guitar.

The neck is really good straight out of the box. I was very impressed - unlike the body it is already nicely finished and silky smooth. I did paint the headstock black and lacquer it, which makes it look much nicer. I also gave the frets some attention, levelling and polishing. I always fret polish new guitars, makes them feel smoother for string bending. I also adjusted the truss rod, which was a little out. The nut looked like it might be an issue, the slots were wide and not cut very deep, but after assembly it doesn't seem to cause any problems.

It took me a couple of weeks to prep the body and neck. It was then that I picked up the manual...

Assembling the guitar took two or three hours. The neck fitted the body absolutely perfectly, no need to adjust. As others have noted, the instructions on fitting the pots are terrible, impossible to make out from the photo which way around they go, I was lucky to get it mostly right first time but the pickup selector switch I put in upside down but easy to correct. When I got to fitting the pickups it all became clearer which way the pots should go - maybe I should have read forward in the instructions first.
It was not clear which screws to use for which purpose - some were longer than others - although not a major problem I ended up with long screws for the truss rod cover and I actually think they were the wrong ones so I'm just going to find some spare small ones and use those.
Once stringed up it all looked really good. Everything lined up well, I adjusted the action and as soon as I played without going through an amp I was really impressed - it sounded really nice and resonant. It actually felt like a good guitar, which was a huge relief! I then plugged it in to my amp and again I was really impressed with how nice it sounded without much adjustment - I haven't yet fine tuned the setup such as intonation and pickup height and I'm not even sure I need to.

In summary, I really enjoyed this project and am delighted with the results. There were no significant issues at all with the kit I received, everything fitted well and worked. I definitely recommend these kits - for the money they really are excellent and overall exceeded my expectations. For that reason I have given it a 5 star review.

I did have an Epiphone SG a few years ago - to be honest I prefer the HB kit. I might even upgrade some of the components over time.

Pros:
Really fun and rewarding project
Great value
Everything fitted well and worked straight off

Cons:
Tuners do the job but some very stiff
Instructions for fitting potentiometers are vague
This might be a new addiction, I immediately want to buy more kits!!

what you get for the incredibly low price:
- beautiful well finished neck, which can almost be used out of the box without filing etc. Nut you may want to replace
- well machined body, which seems to be made out of a higher grade alternative/variety to/of basswood (stronger and darker colored). One or two drilling holes slightly off true, but nothing critical. Sufficiently well matched 2 piece body which is even grained enough to take a stain or a clear coat. An insane amount of sanding sealer means that this is already practically finished and ready for painting should you desire.

Now - should you be able to source these parts elsewhere you will I'm sure pay more than the overall purchase price here. (google search 'bolt on maple gibson neck' for example)

Hardware is passable, but you will probably want to replace the bridge and tuners (losing a star here as bridge is slightly smaller than standard width, so minor modifications required to fit new one, also doesn't match neck radius particularly well). Electronics and pickups are only ok - about standard for entry level guitars (pickups are better than the pots etc) Switch is nice quality, and the pickguard is a nice well finished 3 ply piece.

So in the final analysis - if this is your first stab at guitar building you have something you can enjoy with minor tweaking out of the box, and gradually learn the dark arts of guitar wiring and set up.

If you're a more advanced builder, you have a great platform for mods and tinkering (4 pot control panel etc).

and no, its not a true SG - but can make a great sounding piece all the same..

well done thomann - if my partner wouldn't divorce me, Id be tempted to try another one of your kits

EDIT: the first body part I received was a little out of shape (holes too small or too big, see below), Thomann team was superb (as always) in helping.

It's the first kit I've ever bought, so I won't make a comparison. I've a good friend, an artist, so I said to her: how about painting a guitar body? To prevent any counter-comment about the body of the guitar, she works as a restorer, mainly on paintings on wood.
Currently I own an HB 35, an old japanese strat and a gretsch acoustic guitar, so I decided to go on the kit also because I love the DC/SG style.

PROS
The neck is really a wonderful piece. Perfectly cut, thin, wonderfully comfortable. The fretboard is, too, really well made. I was really impressed before mounting the kit and now, playing the guitar, the neck is the best part. Another pro are the electronics, you don't have to weld cables, the two humbuckers are cheap built, but good.

CONS
With the guitar I received a manual in german and a manual in english referring to a previous model (the jackplate was on the front, not on the side like this one) and it is in black and white and explains how to fix a nut with an exagon key (even a monkey can do that...), 0 space to the wiring. Also, being In black and white, while the cables are colored it would be simple to do a manual referring to colors, with color images. Maybe it's not made in this way because the color may vary. Anyway I solved this problem by going on trial and error, I just inverted the volume and tone but understood that the volume is the one with the plug for the humbucker, the tone is the other one.
The really bad stuff was the body: the piece I received (even before being painted) had completely wrong holes. The stop tail and bridge holes too small, the pickup switch hole too, one of the pontentiometer doesn't fit very well and I have to fix it every time. Yet, the worst stuff was the jackplate. It was too big so the jack plug was unstable. I had to use a wood filler to fix it in a proper and stable position. I guess the neck is made in a different assembly line than the neck, because the difference is huge. Having problems with the jackplate and potentiometers (the jack was unable to stay in position for a long time, it went back inside the guitar. I received completely new parts to subsitute it and now it's fitting perfectly.

Another con is the strap plug, it's on the neck so when you play from 14th to the highest note your hand has to adapt to It. On the SG guitars is generally near one of the "horns". In this way I had to remove it.

SO
The guitar is, nice. Probably at the first time I received a faulty part, now it's ok. I love the feeling of the neck, really smooth. The machine heads are cheap but ok, the hardware is ok. After setting the truss-rod and fixing the bridge for the action I wanted I found that the guitar was already in tune with the octaves. The sound is kinda gloomy and quite "Iommi" style, even when playing on the neck pickup, that's not bad, I like it. Probably the sound is influenced by the body, which is in cheap wood and really lightweight.
I guess it is a good starter kit with good customizing options (for example the pickups can be replaced with something more aggressive). Thumbs up

I'll try to cover it all, if I forget anything, remember, it is about fun, and this totally delivers.

1) Packaging, beautiful. One outer box, three inner boxes. If it had gift paper on it, that would of really fit. Nice boxes and presentation.

But, on the hardware box, the bag for the tuners was open and I'm guessing this had to do with one of the tuners not working. I'll get to that later.

2) The neck, which is the first place most people look for quality and problems.

A) Frets, perfect, as far as I know. Ends meet binding perfectly. Frets had some debris on them, came off easily with proper cleaner.

B) Binding perfect, and really nice touch.

C) Straightness, perfect. Since I adjusted the bridge to height I like, perfect, no buzzing. Plays great.

3) Fit and finish. I'd say perfect. Although the grain on the back of the guitar is better than the front, it all looks really nice. The grain on the back of the neck is not perfect, but, I'll probably stain it dark enough that you won't see it and for the price, I can not complain.

I also really like the grain on the guitar body. I'm sure it will come out great with stain and a protective finish..

4) Hardware. I know it is relatively cheap hardware, but, most of it works really well 100%.

Issues with hardware:

A) One of the tuners would not allow me to tighten it so it fit onto the headstock. Thomann has agreed to fix it and I trust them to follow through.

Another tuner seems to be starting to have issues with tuning. Which, is a shame, since the tuners, overall feel really great.

Eventually, I 'll probably replace the tuners with Wilkinson's, but for now, it is working.

B) At first the middle position did not work, on the 3 way switch, but, it started working. Probably some debris from manufacturing that I worked loose by moving the switch.

C) There does not seem to be a perfect spot for the strap button near the neck, since this is a bolt on. There was a hole on the neck, above the joint, but that would be in the way of playing. I'm not sure where I'll put it eventually, but, I will find a spot for it.

Acclaim for hardware:

A) The pickups I love, they sound a little muddy, but, it is perfect for what I want to use the guitar for eventually. I had to move the bridge pickup down quite a bit for a good dirty sound. For me the sound is quite versatile.

I may add some other features, like coil taps later, but then I would have to change or modify the pickups. I don't think I want to do that on this guitar.

B) The tunomatic bridge and stop tail piece work great. They look like quality and adjust easily. I like them.

C) Volume and tone knobs, I think, work great, I see absolutely no reason to change them. I also really like the knobs. A little close together, but, they work fine for me and I like the look.

5) Issue with staying in tune:

The joint where the neck meets the body is not secure enough, I think. You can pull back on the neck and the guitar, immediately goes out of tune.

I just notified Thomann about this, and, I'm sure they will address it.

I have another Harley Benton, and it is rock solid at the joint. So, I know, they can make it work and will address it.

Conclusion:

I checked a lot of kit guitars and I believe these Harley Benton kits are the least expensive.

That being said, you really get value. The care put into this guitar kit under for $100.00 is amazing.

Also, it has been a great learning experience. I was always afraid to make adjustments on guitars before, but now, just give me the tools and I am ready to go. Remember, there are internet videos for everything regarding guitars. Do research, it pays off.

A great value, and a lot of fun. I hope to get more kits in the future.

I purchased this kit for a bit of a project, with no real intent to keep it after I completed it. I have too many guitars already! So I chose an SG style kit as I'd never played an SG as I'm not keen on the looks of them. That may seem an odd reason to choose a kit, but again this was because I did not want to feel attached to the guitar and so feel no remorse when selling it after completion.

I've had a fair amount of experience with setting up, wiring and fret dressing. So my experience in the build maybe different from someone who has no previous guitar maintenance skills.

The kit went together fairly easily overall.

The electrics were a bit of a fiddle as the diagrams were not particularly clear as to which volume/tone pots were connected to which pickups. So a 50/50 chance to get it correct first guess. (yes, I got it wrong on first attempt, so had to take it apart and redo)

The neck fitted the body well and didn't require any shims to get the correct angle. There were two slightly high frets which I spot leveled and re crowned. The overall wasn't too bad so didn't require a complete fret leveling job. To be fair the two high frets were not terribly bad and the guitar would have probably have been adequately playable as it was, but as I have the tools and the skills for it I did them anyway. The overall fret finish wasn't very good though, they were scratched and rough in places. So they did all require a good fret polishing job. Also of note the light satin finish that the neck comes pre finished with make the neck very smooth and playable.

The body was made of three parts but not too badly matched so a tru oil finish was acceptable after some thorough sanding and finishing.

The tuners seem adequate, they hold their tune and function smoothly enough. I see no reason why they should need replacing.

The finished product.

I was very surprised with how playable the finished guitar was after a full set up. The neck is smooth and fast and I have managed to get a very low action at both the nut and 12th fret. The intonation is also acceptable after I finished setting it up.

Sound wise, I think considering the cheap pickups that you get in guitar kits they sound not too bad at all. I have no complaints about them. Obviously side by side with an expensive set of pickups you will notice a difference though.

Overall for the money with the correct tools and some guitar setup skills you can achieve a very playable instrument. I'm still going to sell the guitar on though as I have too many other guitars and only made this kit for the enjoyment of working on it.

A major issue with the neck (trussrod installation to be exact), kept this kit from being fun and a decent experience. Failure to function results in a 1 star rating.

Overall, almost everything fit together. All parts were in the bags, all bags in the box. Pretty much went together without a problem - except for THE PROBLEM.

THE PROBLEM
As I was stringing the guitar kit up, I thought the molded plastic nut and string slots appeared very low, and my observation was correct. The nut slot was cut so deep the nut rested on the barrel end of the trussrod, and the the strings rested directly on the first fret. Imaging a Zero fret guitar...but this isn't a zero fret guitar kit.

Long story short, I popped the nut out of the slot to find the trussrod end was protruding slightly under the nut itself, and created a teeter-totter surface for the nut to sit on (bad).
As a temporary fix, I shimmed the nut up to get enough action over the 1st fret. Set the bridge height, tuned up and was able to get some decent sounds from the guitar.

The tuners in the kit I received are very poor quality, tuning accuracy and stability are almost non-existent. We need to remember this is a ± $80 US kit.

After noodling with the guitar a few days, I chose to tear it apart, only to find that the truss rod itself was cranked hard (stuck) to get the neck flat, as I loosened it, the neck didn't move, but the end of the rod where the Allen wrench fits in did move, a lot. So much movement that the nut would be popped out of the nut slot as the truss rod was adjusted.

I've since removed the fingerboard, removed the "STUCK" trussrod, corrected the end truss rod routing and will be putting the neck back together with a new fingerboard and frets soon.

Oh, the frets... Yikes, the frets were terrible on this kit.

Sad.

First things first, shipping was just under 5 days. Crazy fast!
How?! How?! Thomann YOU SERIOUSLY ROCK!!

Ok so full disclosure, my son and I have purchased nearly a dozen Harley Benton's over the years and we love every one of them as daily players. They get no rest, and have stood the tests of time.
We've tweaked and upgraded some of them, yet the Plus's remain stock and stand completely on their own. Flawless.

Together we also own several "high end" name brand guitars as well which mainly serve as art on the walls. The HB's get all the love and attention. And are taking up the majority of the wall space nowadays.

My son and I spend copious amounts of time playing your guitars. Your gear is always the talk of the day. And if your reading this and you don't already know it... the HB cabs btw are just..WOW, incredible!! Very happy there as well.

We are so happy we ordered up 3 of these HB diy kits. After just giving them all a good hard lookover...yep...this will definitely work!
Time well spent in the shop is to be had and we can't wait to get busy on all of them. We have some very big plans here.

All 3 have great grains for stain and excellent surfaces for the paint booth. The necks are as good if not nicer than what we have hanging on the walls currently on our other HB's.

Everything is tip top right in the box. Instructions look straight forward enough. Bravo!

So here we sit, VERY excited about the purchases of the day and yet once again we are shaking our heads. How on earth do you do it Thomann? THANK YOU AGAIN!

It's a rare thing today, service, quality and workmanship. Every time we open a box from Thomann we are utterly astounded at the quality, the price we paid and the speed of delivery here in the U.S.A.

It's no secret to us HB die hards. The energy in the room on the arrival of a new HB instrument has always been, inspirational and exciting. To put it mildly.

We are up 5 HB's so far for 23'. I'd say we're ALL IN at this point on Harley Benton. 17 now? I think that's the currant count.

I cannot express it enough, thank you for getting us in the GAME of HB gear. And for all of the unforgettable father/son time on your equipment.

As a Father, to watch my son growing up on the AWESOME HB acoustics and these incredible 6 string electrics we've purchased is literally priceless at this point. And now to be getting into the diy game, it's going to get even more personal. We are very excited to get started.

Cheers to all the content creators out there spreading the word on these AMAZING kits!


From the HEARTland, in a snow covered cornfield.

OUR very best! Thomann!!

I finished this kit, and I am very pleased with the sound. I used Duplicolor rattlecan lacquer in GM black metallic and for the burst I used duplicolor rattle can GM Cherry metallic. For the top coat I sprayed numerous coats of gloss nitro lacquer, wet sanded and polished. it turned out very nice. (I should have sanded a little better, but since it had a wood sealer applied from the factory and said it was ready for laqcuer I did not resand. The neck although very good needed a little fret dressing . I did not level the frets. Intonation was spot on. I left the satin finish on the neck and just sprayed the headstock with satin laquer to seal in the waterslide decal design of my choice. I replaced the tuners with Govers, i wanted to upgrade the bridge and tailpiece, but It seemed the epi replacements were just a tad differend size. I didn;t want to fill in the holes and redrill so I used the supplied parts, which seem to be fine. The neck pickup was DOA. Thomann offered a refund for the pickup, which I thought was OK. i replaced the pickups with Epi pro buckers anyway. I have also built a LP kit from a different supplier, and was very happy with that kit, which had flame maple top. I odered, and am now working on a 2nd SG kit from thomann. The only problems I found so far is the hole for the jack was chipped out probably by a dull bit and was filled in with a wood filler which looked terrible, but will not effect the sound. I am hoping the jack plate covers most of the issue. Anyway, I did notify thomann of the issue, and although I was not asking for any adjustment their customer service very promptly refunded me somthing for the bad drilling.

Bottom line, I don't play in a band, I play for my own pleasure and I am very pleased with the product. I have a amer Strat, and an Amer tele,, A Ibenez Jem 7 and a mini strat. along with the LP kit guitar (which I really like), but it seems that I always reach for the Thomann SG.

Tl;dr - just buy it!!!

Having always wanted an SG, but unwilling to pay ££££ for a Gibson, and being mostly unimpressed with the value-for-money of an Epiphone, I decided to try my luck with this.

I have been very very impressed with this guitar. The pickups are decent enough (very very good for the price), but I will replace them since I am fairly comfortable with soldering etc.

Some key points:
The only adjustment I needed to make was to adjust the truss rod (which you would have to do on a constructed guitar anyway, so it's kind of moot) and to the part of the jack that holds the cable in (it was quite loose and the cable would fall out). The remedy was literally bending the metal a bit with pliers, no real issue. The intonation was spot on, needed no adjustment.

My only real criticism is that in the manual there is not a key as to which screw goes where. If you are totally new to this, it will require some guesswork (particularly to distinguish which screws go on the humbucker rings and which goes on the scratchplate) , but if this isn't your first rodeo, you will be fine.

Do be careful, the wood is very soft: I dropped a humbucker from about an inch onto the wood body and it made some deep indentations.

One other weird (to me) quirk is that when your pickup selector is in the middle, and you turn one of the volume pots all the way down, the guitar is silent (but maybe this is normal, I've not had a three-way selector before).

All in all, this was well worth the money, and honestly rivals a real Epiphone.