Harley Benton ST-62 BK Vintage Series

I have mixed feelings about this guitar. I have never owned a "strat" before, maybe it's just not my type :) In general:
-Paint job looks flawless, I have small crack on fingerboard, but above the nut, so you can hardly see it.
-Frets are finished well for guitar in this price range. You can feel them, but it's not going to ruin your hands
-Guitar needed a lot of adjustments to be playable at all
-Tremolo bridge feels a bit cheap, but it works just fine, and stays in tune!
-Pickups are just fine, with 3 single coils it sound exactly as this guitar type should sound.
-Playability - only issue I have with this guitar, is high string action. 2mm is best I could set (and that's as far as saddle can go), and there's still some buzz.

Overall - It is definitely worth the price. Didn't expect much more. I've seen many worse instrument in this price range. I would not use it as my main guitar, and for that I recommend going for something more expensive. I'am going to buy some more Harley Benton guitars, but some higher models. SC 500 which i bought with this one is absolutely amazing.

First I would like to thank Henning Pauly who did a great job of reviewing this guitar on youtube. If you are considering buying one of these check out his video as well as reading owner reviews.

By way of background, I have owned and played professionally a 70's hardtail Fender Strat, a 90's Strat Ultra and a Tom Anderson hollow drop top Classic. I have sold all of these as I was leaving the UK to work abroad permanently and for the last fourteen years I have been using modelling guitars exclusively for work. Coming up to retirement I decided to build up a collection of guitars for self amusement and have picked up some amazing instruments, many at smile - inducing low prices. The only Strat I had was a Vintage V6 with maple fingerboard which is a worthy instrument but as all my expensive Strats had rosewood or Ebony boards I decided after seeing Henning's video and the pricetag to Give the HB a try.
The bridge and Jack socket plate look cheapish and the scratch plate is sitting proud at the treble horn. The tremelo block looks very thin but I am keeping it hardtail so cannot comment on it's worth. Remember the price and read on. The rosewood board smells strange but I have this on another chinese guitar and once cleaned and oiled it should even out, however the board itself is one of the nicest pieces of rosewood I have seen on a guitar, It goes from dark brown to an almost Rickenbacker orange in a nice marbled style.

Out of the box the guitar plays beautifully and sounds like a Strat. The rosewood board is like an old friend to me already. The Wilkinson pickups look like they may be less expensive than the ones on the Vintage guitar but both sound great. The controls work well and I love the pickguard which is almost flame like and on arrival there was a double layer of protective plastic covering it! The neck is poly coated but still really smooth under your hand. I love the weight and at 3.3 Kg it is one of the lightest and most comfortable guitars I have played on a strap. It sounds and plays better than my 70's Strat, sounds more Strat like than my Ultra with Lace Sensors and while not as good or flexible as the Tom Anderson, it didn't cost two and a half Grand!!! I would be perfectly happy using this instrument live!

Summing up, anyone who plays guitar and is looking for a Strat-a-like has an incredible range af makes and prices to choose from but unless you are looking for a unit with a quality Tremolo Bridge for dive bombing you should give it a try and if you don't like it, at this price hang it on a wall as decoration.

I was looking for a cheap guitar, which looks fairly good, and plays well. The hardware were not a point as I probably was gonna replace them anyway. I think the most important part of a guitar is the neck, if it's bad, you won't like it. This guitar is the perfect platform. The neck is gorgeous, mine has some really minor dents, but all-in-all it's beautiful color and satin finish with a medium thickness gives it a wonderful feel. 22 frets are also a big plus. I've raised the degree of the neck so that the strings lay flat all the way through. Also raised the vibrato bar and set it up to float, added some graphite to the nut. This guitar is rock solid. It holds tune suprisingly well even with the vintage tuners, it even handles some divebombs if you're not extremly violent. For light vibrato use it's flawless, it holds tune nicely and sounds really good. Again, we're talking about a fully cheap spec guitar. I kid you not, this is on par with the base spec Fender strats. The pickups tho - the neck and mid pickups are really nice, but the bridge pickup lacks bass a lot. It's nice for some overdriven rock tones, but for cleans it's so flat that you would mistake it for a plank. Definitely the pickups are the weak point of this guitar, and also the cheap plastic pickguard and potentiometer knobs, but again, these are things that you can easily replace for higher quality ones.

I'm fully satisfied with this instrument and it quickly became one of my favourite guitars. 10/10 would recommend.