Harley Benton SC-450 P90 GT Classic Series

Came to me playable out of the box , set up was done nicely . Action is ok .
one cone due to little ding under the pickguard ( since i removed it ) made by the screw .
Not quite the Gibson shape .. ( i get it )
P90 do to job , my oryginal gibson with humbackers hangs jelously on the wall ;)
If you looking for cheapson less paul ( with this price is rather steal ) and you dont have to have a Gibson logo on the head go for it - you wont regret it .

This little guitar has a bite that you will not understand until you pug it in to amp.

Gitara przyszła dobrze zapakowana, ALE miała urwaną strunę. Po chwili grania zdążyłem zauważyć że przetwornik w pozycji bridge jest zepsuty. Sprzęga dziwnie brzmi i wydaje się bardzo cichy, co prawda mi to nie przeszkadza bo i tak go chciałem wymienić ale dla kogoś kto chce zostać przy oryginalnych przetwornikach może być dużym problemem. Poza tym wykończenie jest średnie ale to gitara za 600zl więc nie mam o co się przyczepić. Jedyny problem jaki mam to bardzo dziwne okablowanie, w porównaniu z Epiphone czy innymi tego typu gitarami to jest po prostu źle zrobione. Ogółem rzecz biorąc dobry stosunek jakości do ceny ale to raczej sprzęt dla początkujących albo jako ozdoba bo bez przeróbek do grania średnio się nadaje.

Edit: przetwornik przestał działać całkowicie

I bought this because I had severe GAS on p90 guitars. I first opted for the SC special one, but I just don't dig the mustard colour. This one is also way cheaper so it's was an easy choice!

It arrived within 3 days after ordering on sunday. Awesome!

The guitar looked great but out of the box there were some small issues. The setup was not great (although not bad) and there are a few little finish flaws. But hey, for this money you can't expect perfection.

Tuners are ok, not going to swap them because they hold tune just fine. They also turn smooth, the throw is a bit short, so when tuning just be really careful.

The nut is cut fine, it's plastic but I don't care. I put some pencil graphite in there and it's now smooth as any nut. EDIT: the nut was causing major tuning issues. Installed a graphtech nut and it holds tune very well. The tuners are really good enough.

Fretboard looks nice, was very dry an needed some oil.
The frets were a bit rough, needed some polishing with 0000 steel wool. Be sure to mask the pickups with tape when using steel wool!

There are a few high frets here and there. Nothing really disturbing. I've set the action on 2mm low e and 1.5mm high e. It buzzes a little, but can't hear it when playing on the amp. I do however want to try a fret level on this one to see how this goes. A guitar this cheap is a nice practise object. EDIT: I leveled the frets. It was my first attempt and I improved the playability. Still 2 or 3 frets that are a little higher. I might spot level them with the next string change.
EDIT: I don't know if the wood in the neck still thinks it's alive. I've done a second full fret leveling as 13 frets were again uneven. It's now completely level and plays great. Hope it stays this way, because I'm not doing a third leveling ;).

The pickups sound ok but not for me. They are ceramic of course and I don't like the boomy attacky sound of ceramic magnets. I ordered some alnico IV magnets to put in these p90's to see if they can sound the way I like them to sound. EDIT: the alnico IV magnets are installed. It didn't really change the tone much. I might go for some vintage voiced alnico 2 pickups. EDIT: A new set of p90's are on the way. A combo of A2 neck + A5 bridge with low output.

The pots are the cheap mini pots and they put linear pots in for the volume control. I like log pots better so I will swap them at one point. They do work fine though and they are not scratchy. I think I will buy Alpha pots, because CTS pots have too wide bushings. You need to ream out the holes and I'm not going to bother doing this :). EDIT: Yeah so I've grown to love linear volume pots... So much better volume control! Really the whole range from 10 to 1 is usable now, instead of most action happening from 10 to 7 on log pots.

The switch is cheap, but works fine, no need to replace.

Oh yeah one nice tip: when ordering I placed a remark asking if they could select a lighter weighing one for me. And they did! Mine weighs about 3.8kg (8.4 lbs) which is pretty lightweight for a Les Paul style!

Because the colour is more copper than gold, I also ordered black plastics for the pickups, switch and knobs. Looks awesome!

All in all I'm happy with the guitar. It's a love/hate relationship with this one. By far the worst HB guitar I've had, but I learned to level frets on this guitar and I dig p90's. I might sell it on later, but will definitely need a p90 guitar in my arsenal.