Harley Benton TE-90QM LH Trans Red

Unfortunately, I will have to edit my initial 5 star review.

Don’t misunderstand, it is a good guitar for the price but it has some serious flaws I can not ignore anymore.

First off all: I use ‘Dan Erlewine’s - How to make your electric guitar play great’ book for setting up all my guitars and I have done that for 10+ years.

The problems: The nut itself was very tall and the nut slots were not cut deep enough. Not only was the action measured at the first fret way too high, but I had to sand down the top of it too. My previous HB guitar, a JA-60 (Jaguar style) came with a perfect nut both in its height and nut slots. So I was expecting something similar with this guitar, but no. This came worse than the China copies you buy online.

Then we come to the frets: again, the JA-60 came with very even and well seated frets this one is a mess spanning from around the 8th to the 12th fret that is some major problems and the frets needs leveling that, if I don’t do it myself, will cost as much as the guitar cost to fix.

As I said in the previews review too, the volume knob came pushed down hard into the finish and pot. meter so much that about half way it started getting difficult to turn it anymore. I had to take off the knob and seat it higher up, though this was an easy fix it is the principle here and this guitar seems to have been made in a hurry or without serious quality control.

Harley Benton guitars are usually good guitars, but overall I can not recommend the craftmanship that went into building this one. I am sorry, but even for the price, this is unacceptable.

The guitar looks good, sounds good, plays well after a setup but at least mine has major flaws that will cost a lot of money to fix and the question I am left with is… will the guitar simply be worth fixing up to a playable standard?

Not sure I will be getting any more HB, though my JA-60 is now a phenomenal guitar after I set it up I just can’t say the same for this guitar and that is a darn shame.

For what it is worth: when I ordered this it was the last in stock which means it might be one of the first made or the last made of that batch.

Also, the tuners are really not that good. They don’t hold the tuning for any extended amount of time.

I might re-sell this as a beginners guitar and cut my losses.

I do enjoy this guitar! However, not without a bit of tender loving care to set it up right! Adjusting the action as well as the harmonics is necessary. A little bit of smoothing some of the frets edges. All this can be done and then you will truly know that this is a good guitar well worth what you paid for.
The vintage pickups really do give you a wide diversity of sound.
Switching from bridge, mixing both or just the neck pickup does offer fuel to your creativity.
And yes, that semi-hollow body has its quality and charm that give it a special touch too.
Also, it is a light guitar (good for us girls who are small framed and the neck is alike a Telecaster , thus thin and good for smaller hands too!
A special and good guitar that you will not regret buying! Which happen to be honestly priced