Harley Benton Guitars

[skully58]

Funny, I just found offsetguitars from your post, looking for insights into the whole Harley Benton thing. I just joined because I definitely have an offset guitar lean and the forum is probably a good place to relate. But on the HB thing...

Short: If you're in Europe, it's probably worth trying out with little risk, but if you're on another continent, look out!

Now I can explain that better. I am in the US, so buying from Thomann is not impossible, but comes with much higher shipping. Back in 2017, I stuck my toe in the Harley Benton pool buying a CST-24 from Thomann. It was new, not B-stock, and I wanted to see if the PRS shape worked for me. The guitar arrived with a twisted neck, and I could not adjust out the problem. I tried to start the return process and Thomann dragged me down a ridiculous months-long customer support rabbit hole full of questions a 5 year old might come up with trying to diagnose the issue. It was pretty obvious they did not want to pay for a return from the US, and were just throwing things at the wall to see if anything stuck. It took months, and they even made me shop my own return shipping, and a few more ugly wrinkles, but I got the return done after literally months. It was so bad I vowed to never buy anything from Thomann again. I had heard good return stories, but they were from Europe. So I guess Thomann really just hates US customers who return bad gear. In my opinion, they wouldn't have that problem if they had decent QC.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago, and I decided to give the HB brand another shot, just not Thomann... I bought an MS-60 from Guitar Center Used that was supposed to be in "great" condition. It arrived with a broken trem, missing trem arm, and a wiring problem causing loud 60 cycle hum even with both pickups turned off. So I returned it, dismayed because it looked decent and the neck was fine. If the trem wasn't broken, I might have kept it because I would have handled the electronics modding the guitar anyway. I don't even know how one of these tremolo units gets broken - they're welded. Yet the trem collet has somehow freed itself and fallen into the cavity.

So I think Thomann cuts too many corners. If you don't kiln-dry your wood, some necks will be twisted. If you buy the cheapest parts you can source, some will break when they shouldn't. If you don't QC, you'll get a lot more returns. These problems are Thomann's own doing. And if you're in the US like I am, Thomann won't like you trying to return bad products.

It would be nice if i could actually try one of them out, it's like Reverend guitars.I really like their Double Agent but nobody sells them around here and at 1k I'm not taken a chance. Harley Benton now has a USA store on Reverb, so I may take a chance.

[skully58]

I have one (cst24), they’re okay. About the quality you’d expect from an Epiphone for slightly less money. If you want something offset in the US I’d sooner buy a Squier or Puresalem if I were you..

Never heard of Puresalem .....after looking at their site, man they are up there in price

[surfin_bird]

I got one of those limited edition competition mustang kinda guitars.
It's a well playing guitar but not remotely close to a mustang. So I can only imagine the same applies to these.

That mustang has just an incredibly chunky neck, the pickups are just very icey strat pickups and the competition stripe was just a sticker covered with clearcoating.

It's currently for sale.

I would do myself a favor and get a second hand squier offset, not because the harley benton's are bad but just because those squier's are much better. (especially the early VM series IMHO)