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A beautiful looking guitar, and a blast to play!
I'm writing this review whilst looking at a BigTone Vintage Orange hanging on my wall. It's a really beautiful instrument, every bit as nice as the product photos promise.
Quality of finish is very good - the orange lacquer, binding and inlays look great. There were a couple of cosmetic issues with my guitar, but nothing that required a return. As with most guitars at this price point, you?ll need to spend money or time on a full setup when you receive it.
Hardware quality is excellent. I might upgrade the pickups for some additional ?twang? in the future, but the stock ones are capable of a wide range of tones. If you?re looking for warm jazz tones, you won?t be disappointed.
Personally, I think the guitar looks more classy without the scratchplate. It?s an odd size and doesn?t serve any purpose as the strings are so high. The two tiny holes left after removing the scratchplate are easily disguised - pop in a couple of flat-head panel pins, and it looks fantastic.
As far as playability goes, this beast takes some getting used to, especially if you mainly play modern solid body guitars.
First, this guitar is massive! The lower bout is 16? and the body is 3.5? deep. For me, this makes the BigTone strictly a 'sitting down' guitar. The tremolo works smoothly, and feels like wrestling a boat anchor in comparison to a modern tremolo. But, these are not criticisms - rather, all part of the vintage charm that makes this an extremely entertaining instrument to play.
You will get terrible feedback if you try using high gain amp settings. That's down to the hollow body construction. And it really is hollow! Other than a 2?x1? support post under the bridge, the body contains only air. There's no centre block, no bracing of any kind. Solution? Don't use high gain settings. This is a guitar for jazz, vintage Chet Atkins picking, perhaps a little Duane Eddy and a dash of Stray Cats. High gain has no home here.
Last, there's that vintage style bridge and tremolo. I think the design is lacking here. The tension bar pulls the strings close to the body, and the bridge is very high. This create a steep string angle, putting lots of stress on the poor bridge - a fragile wee thing consisting of a loose strip of wood with two threaded metal posts and the roller bridge on top. The end result? The bridge slides around when you use the trem, and you can see the fragile bridge support posts straining under the load.
My solution was to raise the tension bar by 6mm with metal washers under the tremolo body (at the two screw points). This eases the string angle and reduces stress on the bridge. I can now intonate the bridge properly, and abuse the tremolo without anything moving around. Hopefully I've increased the life expectancy of the fragile little bridge too.
Bottom line? If you?re looking for a big vintage hit of orange & chrome guitar lovelyness for not much money, look no further. I absolutely love it.
Quality of finish is very good - the orange lacquer, binding and inlays look great. There were a couple of cosmetic issues with my guitar, but nothing that required a return. As with most guitars at this price point, you?ll need to spend money or time on a full setup when you receive it.
Hardware quality is excellent. I might upgrade the pickups for some additional ?twang? in the future, but the stock ones are capable of a wide range of tones. If you?re looking for warm jazz tones, you won?t be disappointed.
Personally, I think the guitar looks more classy without the scratchplate. It?s an odd size and doesn?t serve any purpose as the strings are so high. The two tiny holes left after removing the scratchplate are easily disguised - pop in a couple of flat-head panel pins, and it looks fantastic.
As far as playability goes, this beast takes some getting used to, especially if you mainly play modern solid body guitars.
First, this guitar is massive! The lower bout is 16? and the body is 3.5? deep. For me, this makes the BigTone strictly a 'sitting down' guitar. The tremolo works smoothly, and feels like wrestling a boat anchor in comparison to a modern tremolo. But, these are not criticisms - rather, all part of the vintage charm that makes this an extremely entertaining instrument to play.
You will get terrible feedback if you try using high gain amp settings. That's down to the hollow body construction. And it really is hollow! Other than a 2?x1? support post under the bridge, the body contains only air. There's no centre block, no bracing of any kind. Solution? Don't use high gain settings. This is a guitar for jazz, vintage Chet Atkins picking, perhaps a little Duane Eddy and a dash of Stray Cats. High gain has no home here.
Last, there's that vintage style bridge and tremolo. I think the design is lacking here. The tension bar pulls the strings close to the body, and the bridge is very high. This create a steep string angle, putting lots of stress on the poor bridge - a fragile wee thing consisting of a loose strip of wood with two threaded metal posts and the roller bridge on top. The end result? The bridge slides around when you use the trem, and you can see the fragile bridge support posts straining under the load.
My solution was to raise the tension bar by 6mm with metal washers under the tremolo body (at the two screw points). This eases the string angle and reduces stress on the bridge. I can now intonate the bridge properly, and abuse the tremolo without anything moving around. Hopefully I've increased the life expectancy of the fragile little bridge too.
Bottom line? If you?re looking for a big vintage hit of orange & chrome guitar lovelyness for not much money, look no further. I absolutely love it.
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A
excellent value and looks to kill for
i recieved my harley benton bigtone vintage orange only yesterday, and thought i would give it a trial run at my gig tonight.
i also took my usual guitars (a hofner solid with paf?s, and an electroacoustic by earthfire) , and reckoned i would use the bigtone for a few songs, before giving it a decent setup.
well!!!, i used the harley benton for the full 3 hour gig, and didn?t pick the other guitars up at all.
i work in spain and use backing tracks covering rock n roll, pop, country and rock.
i expected some problems with feedback when i used distortion (line 6 pod), but the guitar handled every song i played ,chuck berry riffs, country twang,chorused pop, even zz top
as a rockabilly guitarist the looks more than fit the bill, and the photos on your site didn?t do the guitar justice, i will probably replace the pickguard and truss rod cover with a nice mother of pearl to match the fretboard inlays, and with a little tweak or two to the pickup height etc, this guitar is a definite keeper
to sum up, the guitar looks terrific, plays well, and i was very surprised at its versatility
for a budget copy of a gretsch that has obviously inspired it, i have nothing but praise
i also took my usual guitars (a hofner solid with paf?s, and an electroacoustic by earthfire) , and reckoned i would use the bigtone for a few songs, before giving it a decent setup.
well!!!, i used the harley benton for the full 3 hour gig, and didn?t pick the other guitars up at all.
i work in spain and use backing tracks covering rock n roll, pop, country and rock.
i expected some problems with feedback when i used distortion (line 6 pod), but the guitar handled every song i played ,chuck berry riffs, country twang,chorused pop, even zz top
as a rockabilly guitarist the looks more than fit the bill, and the photos on your site didn?t do the guitar justice, i will probably replace the pickguard and truss rod cover with a nice mother of pearl to match the fretboard inlays, and with a little tweak or two to the pickup height etc, this guitar is a definite keeper
to sum up, the guitar looks terrific, plays well, and i was very surprised at its versatility
for a budget copy of a gretsch that has obviously inspired it, i have nothing but praise
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Co
Some times you gotta kiss a few frogs!
Let's get straight to the point, I love this guitar! The pickups have a great vintage tone,super chime on clean,snarly when driven,
The term has lovely smooth action,and holds tune,
Tone,volume pots are good,
Frets are super level, and she looks a picture!
But! The quality control on these guitars isn't great,
I had to send 2 back, with shocking paintwork and unusable fretwork,
The 3rd I kept even though the finish is poor,IE runs in paint and inlays on fretboard full of filler to hide gaps,plus fret ends sharp enough to cut fingers,
So why did I keep it? Well once I'd polished up the rough bits this is a beaut to own,plays like dream and looks a million dollars on its stand! .I changed strings to flatwound thomastiks, rerouted the strings over the trem tesion bar,and am well pleased with my purchase,
Just to add Thomann were great when dealing with the rejects and just remember where else would you get such an impressive guitar for such little outlay? .
The term has lovely smooth action,and holds tune,
Tone,volume pots are good,
Frets are super level, and she looks a picture!
But! The quality control on these guitars isn't great,
I had to send 2 back, with shocking paintwork and unusable fretwork,
The 3rd I kept even though the finish is poor,IE runs in paint and inlays on fretboard full of filler to hide gaps,plus fret ends sharp enough to cut fingers,
So why did I keep it? Well once I'd polished up the rough bits this is a beaut to own,plays like dream and looks a million dollars on its stand! .I changed strings to flatwound thomastiks, rerouted the strings over the trem tesion bar,and am well pleased with my purchase,
Just to add Thomann were great when dealing with the rejects and just remember where else would you get such an impressive guitar for such little outlay? .
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j
Love this guitar
Been playing this beautiful guitar for a while now and i absolutely love it.
Pros:
It came very well set up and plays wonderfully.
Pickups sound good clean through my amp, but i haven't really been using it with distortion so i have no idea how it handles that.
It's absolutely gorgeous!
Cons:
I would prefer a pickguard in a different shape, and also it's not very well made, but since it's a clear pickguard, i haven't gotten around to making a new one. Maybe i'll just remove it.
You can see some wires inside the lower hole.. doesn't really bother me.
Recommendations:
Since there are two bars on the tremolo bridge (don't wanna say the famous brand it's copied after) the strings went over the first one and under the second one. This puts too much pressure on the bridge (for my liking) and i decided to put the strings over the second bar instead. I have seen guys do the same on youtube.
Pros:
It came very well set up and plays wonderfully.
Pickups sound good clean through my amp, but i haven't really been using it with distortion so i have no idea how it handles that.
It's absolutely gorgeous!
Cons:
I would prefer a pickguard in a different shape, and also it's not very well made, but since it's a clear pickguard, i haven't gotten around to making a new one. Maybe i'll just remove it.
You can see some wires inside the lower hole.. doesn't really bother me.
Recommendations:
Since there are two bars on the tremolo bridge (don't wanna say the famous brand it's copied after) the strings went over the first one and under the second one. This puts too much pressure on the bridge (for my liking) and i decided to put the strings over the second bar instead. I have seen guys do the same on youtube.
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AM
Good guitar at unbeatable price
Being in USA, I wasn't so comfortable with the idea of buying a guitar in Europe and have it shipped over. However, the shipping was flawless. I got the guitar 3 days after I placed my order, 2 if I take into consideration that when I placed my order was already outside of business hours in Europe.
First impressions: what a beautiful color! finishing was outstanding, really way above what I expected for a guitar on this price range.
The setup was decent, not perfect. I could easily play it out of the box into a gig. I took it to a local luthier that changed the nut (came with a cheap plastic nut), and made some adjustments on the floating bridge. Also, I asked him to polish a bit the fret ends.
The pickups are decent, get the job done. Of course, if you want a specific sound to it, go ahead and buy replacement pickups. But I'm not doing that, just decided to assume this is the sound I gonna get from this guitar, period!
Electronics are working fine. Nothing to add here.
The guitar stays in tune fairly well. I can play for a couple of hours, come back another day and just do minimal tuning.
The intonation was a little bit off.
I would recommend HB to charge $25 more to use a better nut, have it double-checked for intonation, and improve QC on rounding up the fret ends. Then, you would have an amazing guitar out of the box.
As for Thomann, the whole buying process was spotless. I was surprised with the fact that there was a promo for the combo guitar & case, but they came in different shipping boxes. The guitar would be much more protected inside the case, and, most likely, cheaper shipping cost.
Next: buying a HB 52-TE. No hesitation!
First impressions: what a beautiful color! finishing was outstanding, really way above what I expected for a guitar on this price range.
The setup was decent, not perfect. I could easily play it out of the box into a gig. I took it to a local luthier that changed the nut (came with a cheap plastic nut), and made some adjustments on the floating bridge. Also, I asked him to polish a bit the fret ends.
The pickups are decent, get the job done. Of course, if you want a specific sound to it, go ahead and buy replacement pickups. But I'm not doing that, just decided to assume this is the sound I gonna get from this guitar, period!
Electronics are working fine. Nothing to add here.
The guitar stays in tune fairly well. I can play for a couple of hours, come back another day and just do minimal tuning.
The intonation was a little bit off.
I would recommend HB to charge $25 more to use a better nut, have it double-checked for intonation, and improve QC on rounding up the fret ends. Then, you would have an amazing guitar out of the box.
As for Thomann, the whole buying process was spotless. I was surprised with the fact that there was a promo for the combo guitar & case, but they came in different shipping boxes. The guitar would be much more protected inside the case, and, most likely, cheaper shipping cost.
Next: buying a HB 52-TE. No hesitation!
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o
Very good for the price.
Love this guitar. Its not perfect but plays and sounds really good.
Action is good. The 12 gauge strings dont seem heavy and do suit the guitar. Neck seems a bit chunky when you hold the guitar up by the neck but seems perfect when playing.
Some fret buzz but nothing major. Fit and finish not perfect but perfectly acceptable given price. Pickups are very microphonic and not as bright as I would like to imitate a Gretsch but can easily be overcome with EQing. Easy to change also. I put a cheapo P90 in the bridge and love the sound. Overall very, very happy with it. Sounds and looks great for rockabilly and jazz.
Action is good. The 12 gauge strings dont seem heavy and do suit the guitar. Neck seems a bit chunky when you hold the guitar up by the neck but seems perfect when playing.
Some fret buzz but nothing major. Fit and finish not perfect but perfectly acceptable given price. Pickups are very microphonic and not as bright as I would like to imitate a Gretsch but can easily be overcome with EQing. Easy to change also. I put a cheapo P90 in the bridge and love the sound. Overall very, very happy with it. Sounds and looks great for rockabilly and jazz.
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R
Too good to be true
At first I didn't like the tone. But thereafter I started to like it and now it's like a benchmark for my other guitars. I put 12's strings, because it's Jazz guitar, it has to have 12's and now sounds even better. Unfortunately with 12's strings it's not possible to have good intonation and use the additional tension bar on the bridge, so I bypassed it and everythings looks and feels OK. During the period I have it (more than 6 months) I had two issues - the volume pot for the two pickups unscrewed and I had to screw it back, the other is that two times the input jack inscrewed. However it's not a big deal, because I mainly use it at home and have the tools, but it quite questions me wether I need to carry tools with me if I use it outside more often.
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