Harley Benton TE-52 NA telecaster mods

This is the famous Harley Benton TE-52 telecaster guitar.

This guitar has been released by Thomann years ago but its latest iteration features are slightly roasted (a.k.a. "Caramelized") neck and a solid ash body.

To be honest I used to own one of the models of the previous generation and it sounded really nice but the neck felt a bit "unfinished" while the body was quite heavy.

The new model seems to have a neck that is finished nicely and the body seems to be a bit lighter. 

When I received the latest model, I was not disappointed at all. I was actually impressed by the fit and finish and its sounds, right out of the box.

Link to this guitar model: 

https://thmn.to/thoprod/223985?partner_id=73786  

The official guitar specs are:

Body: American ash

Bolt-on neck: Caramelised Canadian maple with Roseacer skunk stripe

Fretboard: Caramelised maple

Dot inlays

Neck profile: C

Fretboard radius: 305 mm

21 Frets

Scale: 648 mm

Nut width: 42 mm

Pickups: 2 Roswell TEA Alnico-5 TE-style single coils

1 Volume and 1 tone control

3-Way switch

Deluxe chrome hardware

Kluson-style machine heads

Factory strings: .010 - .046

Colour: Natural High- gloss

The good:

There were no sharp fret edges, sharp fret tops or weird neck relief (despite the guitar arriving cold). Also, all the electronics work nicely, without scratching noises or any on/off potentiometer taper feel/operation.

The Roswell TEA Alnico-5 TE-style single coil pickups actually sound really good! There is plenty of treble that you can of course control via the tone control and no feedback or microphonic noises. They are not very high output pickups of course, but the bridge pickup can still be used for some heavy metal riffs with the right amplifier or distortion pedal. 

The bad:

The only downsides were 1) After adjusting the action, the action adjustment screws were protruding from the saddle and thus hurting the palm during palm muting, 2) The stock string tress were producing clicking and rattling noises.

The fix: Let the (minimal) mods begin!

Shimming the neck: 

The issue with the action adjustment screws is of course very easy to fix by replacing the screws with shorter ones, grinding down the bottoms of the screws or simply adding a neck shim to the neck pocket. I chose the latter since it's easy and totally free of charge!  

Adding a thin neck shim made out of paper or carton is the easiest modification you can do to an affordable bolt-on neck guitar and fixes lots of issues such as high action, weird intonation and even tuning stability issues sometimes. 

In this case, I just cut out a piece of laminated paper and created a neck shim that is about 0.5mm thick. The shim was placed at the base of the neck pocket.

I used a tiny drop of glue and secured the paper shim to body. Then a bolted the neck back on and adjusted the guitar. The action was nice and low (1.2mm on the high-E string side and 1.3mm on the low-E side). Also, the action adjustment screws do not protrude anymore. 

Upgrading the string tree:

The stock string trees are very simple and they were not tightened very well.

We I tightened their bolts, the rattling noises went away but while tuning the guitar I could still hear some clicking noises. I lubricated the nut using an HB-2 type pencil (classic trick! for tuning stability: https://youtu.be/5mvD8vgROJI ) to make sure the clicking noise was not being produced by the nut. However, the noise did not go away. I remove the string tree of the G and D strings altogether and replaced the one for the High-E and B strings with a roller type tree. The noises went away and the guitar stays in tune for long. An upgrade that costs a few bucks fixed all the remaining issues of the guitar. Cost of the mods so far:  1.90 Eur (!).

Would I modify this guitar further?

-The short answer is: No(!). This guitar sounds and plays nice as is. 

-The long answer would be:  Yes, I can modify the guitar even more, but it does not really require any improvements at the moment. In the future, I am thinking of replacing the saddles with compensated brass ABM VCS-Saddles to get a perfect intonation and slightly different tones

The 250K Ohm 17mm housing controls can be replaced with quality 24mm ones.

The tone control capacitor can be replaced by an Orange Drop one.

The stock 3-way switch can be replaced by a 4-way Fender switch for additional in-series pickup tones:

The jack can be replaced by a high quality Switchcraft one.

The tuners can be replaced by Kluson vintage ones for even more precise and easier tuning.

The nut can also be replaced with a bone or a graph-tech one.

Overall, this is a very nice guitar for a very low price and it is definitely worth a shot, regardless of mods or upgrades. It's a good base for mods but it will play nicely in its stock form too.

Just adjust it to your liking and playing style with the strings of your choice, and take it on the road! 

Owning a few more expensive telecasters I can say that I really don't mind adding some miles to this guitar, maybe physically relic'ing it in the process, all while having lots of fun!

Cheers, 

Thanos