Three Weeks with the Harley-Benton Fusion T style
The Thomann house brand delivers the goods, punching well above its weight. What matters is quality, and what they saved costs on are reasonable tradeoffs.
I have now had the Harley-Benton (HB) “budget” guitar in hand for a few weeks. I have a few observations to extend upon my initial impressions.
First, while I couldn’t find any blemishes in the finish (many people point out on Youtube that there often are small blemishes in the finish) I know that is probably rare. But, as far as I could tell, my unit was perfect.
Of course. I have also bumped into the edge of my desk, so there is now a ding in the back edge of the guitar. Phew, the obsession with keeping it perfect can now be laid to rest.
Still, the fit and finish on this $369 guitar are heads and shoulders above the rest of the offers in this price range (perhaps I will buy one of the $80 guitars to see if that remains true?)
Compared to my $1,000 Charvel, or my $4,500 Tom Anderson, it holds its own.
Second, the quality of the hardware is quite good. Very few nits to pick. The tuners are locking1 (good), but they feel gritty, and they seem to have a low turn to tune ratio (that makes it more difficult to fine tune). I have decided to replace them with Gotoh’s, a great brand. Yes, a minor nit, mostly a preference thing, but it is my guitar dammit, I will do what I want!
The bridge is a knock off of a Hipshot, and it is solid, stable, and looks great. Seriously, this is awesome.
The neck is roasted maple, and it is nicely figured (I need to try to get a good picture of it) so it looks quite purdy. There is a lot of questioning about the “Modern C” shape, as it seems that every manufacturer uses that terminology, and they are not consistent. That said, it is not the wicked fast thin neck of my Charvel, but it does feel pretty nice. My memory is that it feels better than the neck on the $1,800 Fender American Professional II guitar that I was eyeing last year. On a guitar that is < 1/5th the price! Still shape, and feel are very subjective, and frankly, as I have played it over the last 3 weeks, it has greatly grown on me. Yes, I prefer the Charvel neck, and I am glad to have that on my wall, yet the H-B is quite good.
The frets are astounding. One of the things that cheap guitars are notorious for is mediocre fret work. To get the ends nipped2 off so cleanly, and the dressing of the edges to remove the burrs that inevitably are there, finally to shape the crown, and then to ensure that they are leveled is a LOT of handwork. Thus, buying a Squire by Fender guitar often can be improved with some attention to detail by a local luthier. That is 100% not necessary. The one nit I have with the fretwork is that the tops of the frets are not polished. That makes them feel rough, and you can really notice then doing bends. Not a huge deal, I will polish them this weekend when I do my first string change.
My first impressions of the pickups was meh. They felt like they were low output, and muddled when I first plugged them in. The tone control doesn’t have that much effect (but frankly, I leave the tone on full bright 100% of the time) and the volume quickly attenuates the signal to 0. I like having more range.
Having played them for 3 weeks, they actually stand up well on their own. They are clear. The clean sound is pretty solid, and yes Virginia, they growl like a good rock guitar should. Also, I discovered that the tone knob when pulled out splits the humbucker coils so they sound like single coil pickups, and with a clean amp with boosted mids, it sounds quite good.
I will bitch about the pots3 and the pickup switch. The pots just feel cheap. They are certainly serviceable, but the pots on my Charvel and Tom Anderson are smooth, precise, and frankly feel like a million bucks.
Ditto with the switch. It feels cheap, flexible, and bargain basement. Not that I am complaining, a $369 guitar will have to make some sacrifices, and serviceable electronics that are clean sounding if cheap feeling are fully serviceable. One day, I see my self rewiring it. But today is not that day.
The rest of the package
The strings are OK. As I mentioned in my earlier initial review, they are 10’s and I prefer 9’s. I have a set to drop on when I do the fret polish and replacing the tuners this weekend. Also, the tech that installed the strings sort of phoned it in, so they are not evenly on the tuner post. Still super minor gripe. Why change the strings already? These guitars are built in Indonesia4 and then they are shipped to Europe in a shipping container, spending weeks on a boat. That environment leads to some oxidation, and the strings feeling “dead” pretty fast. That also doesn’t help with the condition of the frets, and hence the need to polish them.
Out of the box, the setup was outstanding. Its intonation is perfect, the neck relief is spot on, and the string action is about perfect. I could go a wee bit lower, but frankly that is just not necessary. If you bought one of these for your kid, out of the box it is lightyears better than what I learned on5.
The body is made of a wood called colloquially as “Nato” but it really is Naytoh, or asian mahogany. A lightweight hardwood that is pretty robust.
The main body is painted with a matte finish light blue (sort of like Robin’s Egg blue) that I like. A lot.
What am I going to do with it?
I know the adage is that when someone asks how many guitars you need, the correct answer is “Just one more”. But I really didn’t need this. It was a lark, I wanted to see if they really were as good as people were saying.
Honestly, it is way better than I thought. For the money, it is an amazing deal.
However, you can probably tell from the fact that I am going to replace the tuners, that I will make this a project. As time goes on, I will make strategic upgrades to take a great deal, and make it a superlative guitar. I can see upgrades in the electronics, improved fit and finish, and just general preferences.
I do not think it will overtake my Charvel as my main squeeze, but it is worthy of hanging on my wall.
Locking tuners use a mechanism to hold the string to the tuning post, instead of relying on multiple turns and friction to keep the string wound. This leads to easier string changes, and vastly superior tuning stability.
Yes, that is the terminology, the fret wires are set in the neck with the wire hanging over the edge. Then you “nip” them with “nippers” to match them to the sides of the fretboard.
Potentiometers. They are used to alter the dynamics of the signal for tone and volume
Apparently Indonesia is a hot spot for precision manufacturing of things like guitars. A large capable workforce, and enough infrastructure to support it, means that these budget friendly instruments being manufactured there is a good thing for the people, and we get good stuff. Win win.
In the 1980’s, “Starter” guitar kits sold for $300 with a guitar, strap, cable, picks, and an amp. Often the guitar body was made from plywood, the neck had no truss rod (that means that when the temperature or humidity change, it would bend like crazy), and had action that would make a powerlifter cry. They sucked. All the budget guitars today are amazing!
I only play acoustics and only for a year and a half. Enjoyed the read, tho. Sorry to hear you dinged it already. My cat knocked over my music stand on one of mine recently and put a small scratch on it. One more than it had. As long as they sound good.
Thanks for the update. I'm learning so much from them.