Harley Benton Slider II Vintage Series

457

6-String Lap Steel Guitar

  • Vintage Series
  • Body: Poplar
  • Composite fretboard
  • Scale: 530 mm
  • Pickups: 1 single coil
  • Volume and Tone control
  • Colour: Metallic black
  • Includes tone bar and gig bag
Available since June 2004
Item number 168969
Sales Unit 1 piece(s)
£77
Including VAT; Excluding £10 shipping
In stock within 11-14 weeks
In stock within 11-14 weeks

This product is expected back in stock soon and can then be shipped immediately.

Standard Delivery Times
1

457 Customer ratings

4.2 / 5

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301 Reviews

T
Decent for the cheap price.
TrEr 11.10.2017
I got this as an alternative to using a slide on a normal guitar for studio work. I'm not really a steel guitar player, just a regular guitar player that does a fair bit of slide work and wanted to expand my options with a lap steel.

Pros:

Well, mostly the price to be honest. It's certainly decent value for the money and can be upgraded without too much hassle. Apart from the tuners the build quality seems pretty decent and it sounds ok. The finish is good. If the poor quality strings are replaced it can absolutely be used stock if you spend some time setting it up properly. Pots feel reasonably smooth, no crackling.

So definitely useable but in my opinion it needs a few upgrades (which will easily double/triple the cost) for any serious work. It's great that a gig bag is included, even if it's not the best quality.

Cons:

-The included accessories are mostly poor quality. The slide just felt wrong to me so I got a Shubb SP2 instead and it's a lot better. And I really mean a LOT better! Also, the slide came in a small "fake wood" box with a lid and it literally fell apart the first time I opened it. Unbelievably poor quality, I don't understand why they even bothered including it. Just more garbage for the environment. The guitar cable... well, it works but probably not for long. It's the absolutely cheapest quality imaginable. Went straight into the bin. The gig bag is by far the best and most useful of the accessories but it's still of the cheapest quality.

-The tuners are absolute rubbish. I haven't had the time to change them yet but they will have to go. For the time being I just rubbed some graphite onto the nut slots and that helped a lot with otherwise poor tuning.

-The pickup is a cheap ceramic type and it sounds like a cheap ceramic type. To be fair it's not the absolutely worst I've heard but still very thin and harsh sounding. I replaced it with a Strat-sized P90 from Pete Biltoft and it's a HUGE improvement. The standard Strat size of the pickup means there's a lot of upgrades available, which is a big plus.

-The bridge... I probably won't bother changing it but it isn't very good to be honest.

-The strings... Wow, where do they find rubbish like this! They are just unbelievably poor. I think they may be the worst guitar strings I've ever had the misfortune of testing. Not a big deal to me, I'm using open E and the stock strings were much too thin gauge for this anyway. Before I tossed them I tested them briefly with C6 and they were still rubbish.

-There was some plastic junk around the screws on the pickguard. It looked a bit like the thin plastic film that new pickguards usually come with. It looked like someone had made a poor attempt at removing it, leaving stuff around the screws. Very messy, didn't look good but at least it wasn't too hard to get rid of. Not a big deal but it says a lot about the quality control (or lack thereof).

The verdict:

Obviously the price is the main attraction of this instrument. The absolute minimum investment to make it usable is to buy some better strings and spend some time setting it up properly. Personally I've changed the pickup, pots, tone cap and all wiring too. I will probably also change the tuners. With these modifications I will have a pretty nice instrument for a fair price. But the total cost including all mods will be almost triple the cost of the stock instrument.

Still good value I think and recommended for anyone with the basic skills necessary for the upgrades. If you're not into modding I would recommend moving up to something better.

Edit: I forgot to mention that when replacing the pots with better quality ones I had to drill larger holes in the metal pickguard (a 10mm drill bit was perfect for this). The stock pots are cheap quality miniature ones and the holes are too small for quality pots (the hole for the jack input was already 10mm though).

I also forgot to mention that the bridge was so unbelievably poorly set up that the instrument is close to useless without MAJOR adjustments. The intonation was so bad that any attempt at chord playing above the 3rd fret was hopelessly out of tune. Intonating a lap steel is far more difficult than a standard guitar. I spent more than 3 hours before I was satisfied. You MUST know how to do this to make this instrument even remotely playable. The height of the bridge was also extremely poorly set up. The saddle for the 4th string was set so much lower than the others than the slide missed it completely! And some of the saddles only rested on one leg, causing lots of rattle. Out of the box it sounded more like a sitar-guitar than a lapsteel!!! I think it's safe to say that the instrument was never properly adjusted at the factory. The bridge must have just been slapped on and sent on it's way.

In total I spent about 10 hours of work and 80 euros to make it ok (not including new tuners that I will also probably install at some point).
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L
This is my second HB lap steel and love it
LeonardS 18.08.2020
At this price do not hesitate. If you want to get started with a lap steel this is the one or two to get. Why two? Well then you can have multiple open tunings to play with.
As this is now my second Harley Benton lap steel, I immediately changed the electronics, bridge saddles and tuners.
Below the items I upgraded:
1) Tuners: I selected a set from MGP - Magic Guitar Parts (Germany) which are the Der Jung DJ103BN with the EB28 shafts option. High quality tuners, gear ratio 18:1 and a perfect fit. Day and night difference!
2) Pickup: After some research I selected the Bare Knuckle Boot Camp True Grit ST NB (neck - black) from the Thomann site as for the price you get a hand wound pickup of great quality and the sound is simply full and very warm. This pickup is simply outstanding.
3) Electronics: I selected two of the Fender 250K Control Solid Shaft potentiometers and an Allparts Switchcraft 1/4" Mono Jack. All these items I got from the Thomann site.
4) Knobs: I selected the "Fender Potiknob Set Jazz Bass" for the knobs where I use the large one for Volume and the small one for Tone.
5) Bridge saddles: I was unable to find a replacement bridge which would fit in terms of size, so I opted to just changed the saddles. From the Thomann site I selected the Highwood Guitar Parts HG-10,50 Vintage Saddles. They are certainly an improvement in terms of sound and avoids rattle.
I now love this lap steel as I am sure it can compete with the best.
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J
Nice kit on budget..
Jules.alex.L 12.11.2021
bought pretty much on a whim, this piece of kit punches well above its weight sound and playability wise. Ok- you could criticize in quality of parts used etc but the bottom line is it sounds good and was ridiculously good value. For what it is- can't fault it..
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Pd
Great entry point
Piper d98 03.10.2021
Ordered with a gift card i received from a labelmate as thanks for some help with bass tracking. The build quality is impressive for this price, potentiometers are quite frictiony and the tuners jump around a little but the body itself is solid as a rock.

The lone single-coil sounds a bit dinky at first but once you get your pedals/amp dialed in to add some beef it sounds really nice, not microphonic at all and gets some lovely twang when you compress it a bit! Shockingly little hum as well.

This is my first dedicated lap steel but i've had quite a few guitars in my day and i can definitely say that most people will definitely get quite a bit of use out of this thing. I'll likely be upgrading the pickup and tuners at some point but it's definitely a very competent instrument as is.
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