Harley Benton R-458 BK Progressiv Series

I've been playing guitar for a long time, and I was curious to try those 8 string guitars that are rising up now in the market. My problem, as many other people, the budget. I was not in position to buy a 900$ guitar now, so I told myself that this budget 8 string could satisfy my curiosity, and if it failed as a guitar, the economical loss won't be as much. But it paid off:

Pros:

-Good construction and finish, it feels a bit light but not an issue.
-Good tuners.
-Good electronics. For the sound gourmets maybe these pickups are not of their taste, but they do a pretty good job IMHO. A little too hot I must say, but that's not an issue for me.
-It doesn't feel as alien when coming from a 6 string. This is because of its neck length and width. It feels very comfortable.
-Well intonated and decent string action (for my taste anyway)

Cons:

-The nut is made of cheap plastic, I strongly recommend to change it. Also it's set up sort of too high, when you voice a chord in the 0-3 frets and you apply a little bit more pressure, the chord detunes a lot.

- The strings are too light for what the instrument is (the F# one, so the 8th, felt like I was holding a bow instead of a guitar...). Change the set and get harder strings (like a .10 or plus).

-It depends on the unit, but for mine I will need to do a fret job. Some frets buzz where others don't (not a truss rod issue, that's tested already)

-Packaging. Just covered in carton board and air bags to secure the instrument, mine came with a hit in the head, half the size of a pinky's nail. Not something that is very bad but I could've been less lucky.

-The jack plug is not well grounded/connected, I get a familiar not-good-grounded noise (like when you touch the tip of a connected jack) when I move the jack in a particular position . I haven't opened the guitar but it seems like a quick fix.


So there you have it, as it is a budget instrument you'll need to adjust it, but for what it does and what it costs it is very good.

Ok...received in 3 days. When unboxing it became obvious this guitar needed some tlc to get it set up correctly. I dont mind tinkering, especially with such a cheap experimental instrument such as this...the temptation to go 8 string experiment I specifically refer !! I daresay you get good ones and bad ones so I will rate mine as satisfactory as it WAS perfectly playable out of the box. However, I had to slacken the 5 neck bolts to pull the neck slightly as the strings were not parallel with the neck and aligned with the pickup poles properly...5 mins and it was was fixed...has not moved since. Neck joint very snug so take some comfort in that fact. Next...intonation was out but theres plenty of adjustment and another 10 minute job fixed that. Scale length is short for an 8...compared to other manufacturers but hey, it makes for an easier transition from 6 to 8 as it feels "normal" at 648mm...only the width to become familiar with. Finish on fingerboard and back of neck is perfect...fretwork is sublime and makes a very low action achievable if you so desire. Body is a beautiful sculpted shape and very well balanced on the strap without neck diving at all. Tuners are good and nut is cut well...bonus! Strings supplied aren't the best and sound a little dead but some Kerly's will sort that out when required. Sound is pretty good overall...bridge is lively and full sounding across the strings without excessive muddiness at all. Neck pickup is very warm and usable too. From clean to extreme distortion this thing really works well with a Zoom G3X processor with all of its many possibilities !! I opened the rear cover to look at the electronics and its a bit shabby looking but I finished it off to a better standard...its all cheap but functional stuff though. Whats has really made me fall in love with this guitar is the potential to increase it tonal capability...I'm talking about the pickups...they are 4 wire as standard...coil taps please...thank you. I fitted a mini toggle to achieve this + a 1meg tone pot (more treble) and...BOOM...now I have the most versatile instrument I have ever picked up...I mean WOW...its capabilites are endless and it all works beautifully to my ears. The heavy tones are there anyway but shrill, strat type highs are all there to be released for the sake of spending 10 quid on a pot and a toggle switch + half an hours work. You DO NOT need to swap out the pickups on this thing as they are workable. Simply one of my best purchases ever...although I have voided any warranty I don't care as my "experiment" has worked for me and at this price I ain't bothered anyway. This thing is built excessively and nothing can go wrong...Thanks Thomann for bringing this wonderful budget guitar...well pleased.

I bought this Metal monster machine around 4 y ago. I was curious and I start researching on 8 strings guitars in the internet. Så came out that the cheapest one was the Benton. I was thinking maybe I don't like to play 8 strings and considering the price I convinced myself in buying it.

I have to say is very well made for the price and it sound great . Dedicated for metal but is possible to play also clean and synth \ drone stuff.
If u wander about how to get some sunn o))) kinda shit > this is the instrumenten!!!

lit bad was that I couldn't unscrew the neck because one screw didn't came out so I damaged edge it. And the machine are absolute not good.

A part of this 2 bad consideration the guitar is very nice .

I made also a video review if u wanna listen how it sound : https://youtu.be/qifoUOa69vQ

After watching a load of Rob Scallon videos on YouTube, I decided it was time to try out an 8-string guitar. I had never played an 8-string before this purchase, nor have I ever played a 7-string, and so I was dreading the increased neck width, which I was expecting to be overwhelming, much like it is (for me anyway) on a 6-string bass.
Thankfully the increased neck width didn't really phase me, and the whole guitar felt quite comfortable to play, despite the few sharp frets. Much to my surprise the lightweight guitar is actually nicely balanced and not even remotely headstock heavy.
So this guitar has impressed me twice straight out of the box. On top of that all of the hardware seems pretty solid.
Although, I'm not a big fan of the pick-ups, they're a little too bland for my tastes (but since I'm running it through a Marshall Valvestate 8080, they still sound pretty good). And finally the fretboard needs a clean, which seems to be a trend among all the Harley Benton guitars I have played: they all seem to come with dirty fret boards, nothing a drop of lemon oil won't fix when I change the strings.

Overall it's a pretty solid guitar, which I've got tuned to some form of Open F (FCFACGCE). It needs a bit of a setup, a clean and a new set of strings.

As an owner of both guitars, I can see that almost every feature and measurement of this is extremely similar to the RG8. And why not, right? Both great guitars. The frets are about half an inch smaller all along the neck, in comparison to the Jumbo frets on the Ibanez.

This Harley Benton is the best and cheapest entry-level 8 string on the market. However the pickups are very bad and noisy in comparison to the Ibanez. The Ibanez delivers the clairty you hear in modern progressive metal bands, and the warmth and diversity for everything else. The Harley Benton sounds embarrassingly weak, but pulls off clean tones well enough to be enjoyable.

The Harley Benton is great for playing unplugged. It's about 1/3 lighter than the Ibanez due to the smaller, rounded body and the smaller fretboard makes it easier to get used to using the 7th and 8th strings.

The tone/volume pots and very delicate, consider taking the back panel off and reinforcing them, using them lightly is the only way to avoid damaging them as they are cheaply fixed at the back.

Consider taking it to a technician as it probably went through a cheap set up, mine needed intonating and the string height adjusted to avoid the 7th and 8th string fret/string buzz, which you will get on the Ibanez too.

If you're buying an 8 string for the first time, buy this one. If/when the novelty wares off then you won't have wasted £300 more for the Ibanez. If you have the money, and don't like hoarding/testing guitars, buy the Ibanez!

If you're looking for an 8 string guitar without breaking the bank, this is the one to go for.

I ordered this on a whim after listening to an Animals as Leaders album and deciding that I wanted to have a go at the whole extended range experience. It's absolutely not what I play live, so there was no point in spending a fortune on any of the (really very nice) 8 strings that are available from the 'premium' brands, so I thought that this would do the job.

Some other reviewers have noted that some setup was needed when the guitar arrived, but this wasn't my experience at all. It arrived promptly, and straight out of the box I was able to break into some seriously heavy riffing. The finish was remarkable for a guitar at this price point, and would rival instruments at several times its price. I find the neck to be very pleasing to play on, and the guitar is well weighted.

In terms of shortcomings, the guitar does show its price in some ways. The pickups have a tendency to sound a bit muddy, particularly when shown to any sort of gain. They lack the clarity of some of the big-name pickups, but this is to be expected when a single pickup can be more expensive than this whole guitar. If I were to be using this live I would consider swapping them out for something from Seymour Duncan or DiMarzio, but the fact that I would do that instead of just buying a new guitar should speak highly of the basic quality of the instrument.

Other shortcomings include the tuners, which have been prone to slippage in my experience. Nothing too major, but frequent retuning is necessary.

Overall, if you're interested in trying out the extended-range world, this Harley Benton is a great place to start!

Everything you?d expect from a cheap guitar is missing from this.

Excellent tuners, something I was really concerned about as most cheap guitars come with awful tuning machines, these are really solid, hold tuning extremely well and are very consistent and just sensitive enough to make tuning totally fine.

The neck is delightful with a super light finish that almost feels like playing bare wood. Quite thin but definitely not too thin and a nice, flat D shape make it really comfortable to play.

The frets are pretty much perfect, and another area that was super surprising (cheaper instruments tend to have patchy fretwork at best) ? no sharp frets, everything is filed nicely.

The bridge is really solid, too, and coupled with the neck and frets, makes super low action totally doable.

Knobs and switch are fine and sturdy, nothing is loose/falling off.

The only downfall here is the pickups, they?re far from fantastic and really high output ? I always change pickups on guitars though and considering how easy it is, this really doesn?t put me off.

Stock strings are a little light and, coupled with the short-ish scale length, mean the bass strings were a little droopy when I got this, but a thicker set of strings fixed all that.

For the price, I?m really, really impressed; a pickup swap and a light setup turn this guitar into something I?d stack up against any guitar below £500.

I've been searching for an 8 string to play with for a long time because I've been wanting to try one. I've heard about this guitar from Henning Pauly of YouTube Channel EytschPi42 and Glen Friecker of YouTube Channel
SpectreSoundStudios. And if not for them I would have never come across Harley Benton at all.

The Guitar is constructed very well. Sounds amazing in my mixes. But My only problem was that there were sharp fret ends on bot sides of the fretboard. Nothing an experienced guitarist can't fix. Aside from that I have no other problems with the guitar. Because I'm so satisfied with Harley Benton guitars, I'm considering starting a collection of Harley Benton guitars. The FanFret-7 BBB 2018 DLX is next on my list. Thank you Thomann for this brand of guitars.