Harley Benton JA-60SB Vintage Series

SOUND: The guitar's tone is amazing. Sounds just as good as the $1k+ Fender Jazzmasters.

QUALITY: Here's where I have an issue. The parts themselves are all good quality, but I'm unable to intonate the 6, 5, and 4 strings (E,A,D). Even with the bridge saddles all the way in (toward the neck) those strings are not intonated at the 12th fret. The only explanation is that the actual bridge position is to far toward the tail of the guitar. It's only a centimeter (if that) of difference, but when it comes to intonation, it makes all the difference.

SUMMARY: I understand that these guitars are at a beginner price point, but they truth is that they are better than that. My TE-52 set my expectations high after it ran circles around my Fender Tele. I'm a gigging musician so intonation matters to me.

I will continue to buy HB guitars, because I think they art an absolute steal for the price, but I want to be honest in this review about my experience.

My hope if that Harley Benton will step up their QC a tiny bit to account for these types of mistakes. Without this bridge issue, I would have literally nothing wrong to say about this guitar.

I have had this guitar for several years now and hadn't realized that I didn't post a review. The stock pickups definitely did not sound bad, but I had a set of Lace Alumitone P90s already, so I put those in soon after I got the guitar.

This is a very comfortable guitar to play, with a slightly fuller neck profile and tall frets. I did need to smooth out some sharp fret ends and polish the frets as well; they were all pretty level, no noticeable fret noise or buzzes. The nut was a bit tall but playable - I've since sanded a bit of height from the bottom because the slots were done well. The neck has a very nice satin finish which I didn't feel the need to sand off. These offset bodies are always my favorite for playing either standing or seated, this one is no exception and it has a solid positive fit with the neck with good weight and balance. I still enjoy playing this guitar all the time.

Not sure if this is the same with the new models, but the pickguard is just a decal of sorts on a white 3 ply guard it seems. My pinky has worn the tortoise shell graphics right off from years of resting it there as I play. It doesn't bother me but I figured I should mention it.

I was very surprised by the overall quality for such an affordable guitar. I would say this is an incredible value for the price. I've played several hundred guitars and have played far worse brand new guitars from other makers in the same price range. Very much worse.

I will add that I've also since bought a Harley Benton TE90 FLT model from Thomann and it is equally impressive and possibly more so. The pickups are pretty mush spot on for my Filtertron taste. I would basically make the same assertion about the neck and fretwork as this JA model. Playable out of the box, but needed a bit more setup work, in my opinion. They just seem to build solid budget guitars.

This is a beautiful guitar. The pick guard seems to be a bit polarizing but I think it fits the vintage vibe. Finish on this one is near perfect. I love the sunburst finish and off-white neck binding, pitch covers and controls. The only blemish I have found is a bit of bubbling in the chrome finish on one of the tuning heads. More on those later. Playability out of the box was just ok. It needed to be setup, truss rod and intonation adjusted and have the action lowered. The frets, although having the ends finished quite well and being very well leveled,, were a bit rough and needed a mild polishing. The strings were in pretty good shape but since I had to have the whole thing apart for set up work, I put some new 9?s on it. Now it plays really well. Comfortable neck feels very similar to a vintage spec?d stratocaster. The tuners are passable. They keep it in tune, but feel a bit skippy and one is quite stiff feeling. As far as sound goes, these Roswell p-90s are very hot. Very different from real Jazzmaster pickups. They?re not bad sounding pickups, but I?ve noticed that they sound too similar to each other. I?m not sure if these pickups are a matching set with dedicated neck and bridge specs or if they?re identical to each other. I?m guessing the later. The tone pot doesn?t seem to be very usable. Nothing happens until you get down to around 3, and then it?s just all dark down to 1. This might as well have been a switch...
I have however found a couple very usable and great tones out of this. The pickups lend themselves out to do both clean and dirty very well. Over all I?m very impressed by this guitar. Be prepared to do a little work on these guitars, so it might not be the best for a complete beginner, however for only around $150, it could be a great guitar to get your hands dirty with and learn about setups, mods etc.

I bought this guitar because I wanted one with P90 pickups. This is a very cool looking guitar with very good paint job and finish.

Weight wise it is light and well balanced. The tuners are replicas from the vintage ones and work perfectly with a good feel.

The strong point of this guitar is the sound. Those P90 sound great and are exactly what I was hoping and, as good as the sound you get from guitars that cost several times this much.

For me, the tortoise effect of the pickguard looks a little ?fake?, but it may not bother you and is purely aesthetic.

Out of the box, the setup was good, with a nice low action and perfect intonation.

Although the neck feels very good, without sharp fret edges, it had some solvable issues. Out of the box, it looked dry and had some glue residue, especially on higher frets. The frets needed some polish and some of them were not perfectly leveled. Those issues can be easily fixed or if you are not comfortable doing it yourself, a guitar tech will do it easily (choose your guitar tech wisely). If you are not as picky, as me, those issues may not bother you at all.

After taking care of the neck, I shielded the cavities, put some roller string trees and a new nut (BlackTusq), this guitar became perfect for what I intended. Great sound and perfect playability.
Every guitar I own, even much pricier and from top brands needed those mods and a setup to bring up their full potential.
There?s no guitar with similar characteristics in this price range. This is a must buy.

quality instrument for the price, im really liking the p90s even tho they arent the most expensive kinda, they stiill have that signature p9+ sound.
Also this is the only guitar where is actually prefer mid position of pick up selector, intonation is not perfect up the neck but for the price i dont mind higher frets being slightly out of tune. would recomend this instrument for anyone who wants to get into p90s for a low price. Get on of these cooller color variants tho that have now. tuners are not greatest but guitar still holds in tune fine. and shorter scale lenght is cool to have on at least few guitars that you own. just cant go wrong with this price point.

This was of 5 guitars I bought from Thomann at the same time and it was the cheapest.

The guitar is actually quite good but for the money I paid for it I would have to say Very good for that price, and certainly better some name brand guitars I have bought at more than twice the cost of the JA-60.

The finish is very nice, I'm a sucker for a 3 colour sunburst, and this sits beside my American Strat (another 3 colour sunburst) and doesn't get put to shame.

The body appears to be 5 pieces of wood put together very well, and the guitar is very light, probably the lightest guitar I have ever owned.

The hardware is all good, nothing to really complain about, with vintage style tuners which appear to be stable with a good ratio with no clicking or slipping...they seem quite smooth.

The pickups are wilkinson so of a reasonable standard and I can't think of any reason at the moment for swapping them out, they're fine.

The neck is really comfortable, in fact of the 5 guitars I got this is the preferred neck, with a lovely satin feel...I always rub down my necks to a satin feel as I hate the stickiness of gloss necks. Action was a little high for my taste but easily lowered with a couple of quarter turns on the bridge. I also cut the nut a little lower to my liking. The only gripe I had about the guitar was that the frets required a bit polishing as they felt 'scratchy'...when bending strings I could hear and feel the strings on the unpolished frets. But remember that this guitar is less than a 100 quid so I really cant complain at all.

Overall, a great wee guitar, I would recommend to anyone who doesn't mind attempting to set up their own guitar..and I think all guitarists should do that...

Lately, I've been digging some gnarly surf guitar classics. Pipeline, malaguena, etc. The ja-60 sb fills the bill, save one thing. First though, fantastic looks, the finish looks so good it has thwarted my desire to relic it, maybe temporarily. It is very playable, stays in tune, sounds good, but not as good as my Squire vintage modified tele, which also has 2 p-90 pups. The one thing that is missing, for surf music, is a vibrato, which I will add. The neck is good, looks killer, I have gone over fret ends with a file, but that is common practice. All in all, a great value for the money! I do not regret making the purchase.