Harley Benton SC-550 II PAF

All the recent positive reviews on Youtube did not prepare me for this beautiful instrument delivered to me today from the first factory batch of 2022. It looks sublime, is a joy to hold and was tuned and set up spot-on before delivery !!! The overall finish and workmanship is excellent. The lovely neck came with beautifully polished frets. The 3 way switch works well and feels solid. The volume controls do the job graduated evenly, and the tone pots equalise steadily all the way from closed to open. The Tesla pickups are well worth the upgrade HB installed on this mark ii of the popular SC550. The sounds through my old Zoom GFX-707, right through from clean to dirty, are breathtaking . I can't stop playing it. I actually shed a tear of joy (Welsh). Why the hell would you buy a Gibson when you can get this superb thing for less that £250?
Please thank your folks in Indonesia for me.

I don't want to ramble. I purchased this guitar, one of HB's most expensive, expecting to have to fine-tune it. I'm skilled at doing my own set-ups, geometry, etc. I didn't expect a perfect guitar at this price point. I expected some finish issues, fret issues, tuner issues, possible pickup issues. Here's what I found when it arrived, most important to least, (at least for me):

1) I love the stainless frets and they were polished/finished pretty good except for 2 or 3 frets. They had obvious tool marks on the frets that caught the strings. I had to clean them up and polish them. While I was at it, I did some additional buffing on all the frets since I was already working on it. If not for those two frets or 3 frets, it would have been nearly ready to go.

2) Output balance was off between pickups. I assumed one of the pickups was bad and had planned on replacing them anyway. I put a pair of Gibson '57 Classic's in it, (two-wire, so the wiring was pretty much drop-in), but the neck put out nearly twice the power of the bridge pickup. It was odd. I had the the neck pickup below the surface and the bridge almost touching the strings and they still weren't balanced. "

Long story short, I did a complete rewire using standard H-H wiring with one toggle switch and everything balanced out and the TONE changed. I honestly don't know if they were drunk when they wired it or what but rewiring it turned into the guitar I expected!

3) I don't like, "Kluson" tuners, period. But, I figured, if I have to live with them, then I'm putting good ones on it. I installed Grover vintage-style, "Deluxe" tuners, simply because the gear ratio was higher. Did it matter? Not too much. The stock tuners were about the same.

Finish-wise, I only found one issue and it was hard to spot. When the light is shining just right on the neck, there's a fine line that runs from the back of the nut to the edge of the fingerboard, at a diagonal. It's just a finish crack and it took me a while to find it.

I would have given this 5 stars for sound if it had been wired correctly but I couldn't find a wiring diagram online that matched this mess. And when I rewired it to a more conventional H-H wiring, everything worked!

It was well worth the work and effort. I wouldn't change a thing. It's now my #1!

Sc 550 ll paf arrived today and I'm happy 😄 it's very beautiful to look at but has some QC issues😩 in fairness it cost less that the pickups of the guitar it's trying to replicate & it's sounds great through my 76 Roland jc 120 and the fit & Finnish is fab and all the electronics work as they should. OK from the guitar I received today with the issues it has I will be still be keeping it as I tuned it up I realised it has good potential very resonant and good weight feels solid in the hand with nice size neck, so getting it booked in for a proper setup to start with. The nut seems to be cut low on the d and the g string and is buzzing a little in the middle on the neck both strings. The action is very low but I like it Iike this if I can get it to play well at that height. The tuners are absolutely useless and need upgrading constantly at them while playing and sure last and not least there are several fairly sharp frets which will have to be seen to aswell. All that been said after a good setup and maybe a new nut and new tuners this guitar will be a les paul killer. I recommend to buy one and then get it set up. Hope this helps cheers.