Harley Benton GS-Travel Mahogany

555 Customer ratings

4.7 / 5

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419 Reviews

Harley Benton GS-Travel Mahogany
109 €
All prices incl. VAT
In stock
In stock

This product is in stock and can be shipped immediately.

Standard Delivery Times
Delivery free of charge expected between Thursday, 4.04. and Friday, 5.04.
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SH
Lovely, sweet little guitar
S Harrison 09.02.2018
I bought this to play lounging on my sofa, laying on my bed or outside in the garden.
Out of the box, it's very playable - I haven't changed anything.
The mahogany gives a warmth to the sound, which I like. On a guitar body this small I don't think you'd need the brighter sound of a spruce top - I haven't tried the spruce version though.
Mine has a closely grained mahogany top rather than the more striped look of the one in the pictures - mine looks lovely. It's pretty light weight - ideal for what I bought it for. It sounds and projects much better than you'd think from the size (and price).
If I hadn't bought a CLA-15m soon after I'd be picking this up all the time - as it is, I pick it up a lot.
It has clarity, punch and warmth that are way above it's size and price tag.
Now the big question - is it as good as the Taylor? I have no idea, I've never played one. But it's the wrong question and missing the point; For the likely intended uses of this guitar, it's as good as you need.
Don't get me wrong - it sounds good, it plays well and it's fun to play. But do you really need to pay over £500 for a travel/sofa guitar?
It's hard to justify that unless you're recording with it a lot (to cut through the mix - and this will do the job). Or maybe want a smaller scale instrument for a child/teen. You could buy this and get two custom line acoustics (Harley Bentons) for that money - I know which I'd prefer and that's exactly what I've done.
Tuners - they do their job. People complain about a lot of new guitars not holding their tuning but it's just because they haven't bedded the strings in - (pull them away from the guitar 3-4 times, tune the string back up, do this 3 times for each string - you'll now hold your tuning). Speaking of which - when I tried that on this guitar the peg came off on the lower E string - I'm not bothered; I put it back in and developed a method of pulling the string parallel to the body, which works fine.
Construction is fine - don't expect bone nuts and bridge saddles at this price.
It's very neat and tidy, rather attractive and I love the curve on the back.
I have an old Martin travel guitar - I never play it. This is so much better - it's a proper guitar, just a bit smaller and light weight.
For the price it's a bargain - it even comes with a neat little gig bag.
If you want a full blown acoustic, I'd recommend one of the custom line ones. But I have plenty of guitars and I can't resist this little beauty - it gets far more of my attention than the price would suggest.
You know you want one.
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T
Unfreaking believable!
Toddio 23.03.2022
I bought the HB traveler for my son in Colorado, hoping it would be even remotely as good as a 650 dollar baby Taylor. My son took it out of the box on his lunch break, tuned it up and recorded a song. Sounded awesome! The guitar belts out low end like my son's full size Taylor for 1/15 the price. Truly excellent quality at any price point. 90 bucks seems like a dream!
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B
Small but mighty
Burningboy 08.12.2022
I bought this for teaching guitar. I work in primary schools and I needed a travel style axe and flexibility as I cycle to work. Also I wanted a guitar that I wasn't very precious about it, as younger students might like to try their talent with it while I'm out of the room....
I am a lefty and I knew I would have to change a few things to use it. (There was no lefty option available at the time of purchase). First job, I had to the change the mini tuner heads, they just didn't do the guitar any justice. I built a lefty bone nut and re-angled the saddle to mirror the direction for lefty, .The bridge material took the reworking very well..
The bag lasted about 2 years before wear and tear started shredding the straps, I gave it a lot of hardship as I attached other bags around the arm straps, with a heavy sheet binder and sometimes shopping etc. It was a champ......
The tone is lovely and warm, bright, punchy and clear. It has surprisingly good volume, maybe because of the bowled back. the neck profile is very comfortable and I love the scale length. It feels strange to go back to a Takemine.
All round lovely little guitar for any purpose. Sounds nice acoustic and in recordings.
It holds its own in a teaching environment against a couple of dreadnought guitars volume wise.
I give it about 25 hours of playing a week. It is showing no signs of fatigue after over 5 years, frets are still solid and straight, no fingerboard wear.
If anything happened to my present model, I would consider buying the lefty version. Hope this helps.
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J
How do they do it?
Johan12 27.02.2020
I own this guitar for almost 2 years now and I absolutely love it. It's my only guitar at the moment and I play it daily.
I have been playing guitar for about 10 years. I mostly fingerpick and this is where this little guitar excells. It can also handle some light strumming but don't expect wonders.

All in all I would certainly recommend this guitar to beginners but also to more advanced players looking or a great little guitar to leave around in the living room or to take on holidays.
I have owned more expensive Takamine guitars and sold them all beccause I didn't play them anymore.
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b
very good and excellent for the price
bertr4n 19.01.2024
Even famous brands trend to have issues with entry level instruments, this is not the case here. One might want to improve the fretting finish and obviously change the strings, but out of the box the intonation was surprisingly good.
The sound is on the treble side, pretty bright, a bit zingy but that's exactly what I was looking for. It's not the best acoustic guitar, but it's a good one. I particularly enjoy the shorter scale, and although I'm not a fan of v necks, this one is not too exaggerated so it's fine.
I don't mind the looks, it could be ugly with the same soubd and playability I wouldn't mind, but it turns out that it's quite nice to look at, the headstock looks better in real life than in pictures.
The bag is ok, not just a dust cover, but rather tight. I could use an outside pocket for picks, bar, bottleneck and strings because the front pocket on a gig bag is a bit dangerous to use for thick or heavy items being in front of the table.
Excellent value for the money.
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D
My new constant companion
Danno79 26.07.2017
I've had this little guitar for around a month now and I just can't put it down. It's the perfect companion for travelling around, or just chilling on the sofa - it really has rekindled my love for playing.

Pros - this is surprisingly well built, especially considering it only costs 75 euros! Having compared it directly to the Taylor GS mini (which it is pretty much an exact copy of the body and neck shape), it is just as well made, and actually more robust in some ways as it has proper binding on the edges of the body, where the Martin just has raw plywood edges. The finish on mine was great too - I really like the subtle satin lacquer. The case is well made too, and is also very similar to the taylor case. The sound is clear, loud and well balanced considering the body is so small and the mahogany top gives a great mellow roundness to the sound.

Cons - There are really only a few very minor niggles with this little guitar - it's really easy to play but for me the action was a tiny bit too high out of the box - that was easily fixed by sanding the underside of the plastic bridge a little. Also the factory fitted strings weren't great, a decent set of phosphor bronze ones fixed that though. Personally I'm not a huge fan of the shape of the head-stock, but that's just my taste and can be overlooked for the incredible value this guitar represents.

The only way this could be improved upon was if Thomann could offer an electro-acoustic version - then I'd buy the spruce version as well!

Overall I would highly recommend this product, just a bit of a shame I had to wait 4 weeks for it come back into stock, but I guess that just shows how popular and great value they are!
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MH
astonishing sound
Millie Hel 04.12.2023
Got this guitar for my daughter , who just started playing.
As it is now, I find myself playing it more than my other acoustic for 4 times the price.
I find the sound amazing , not just for this price range. very warm and full. Especially open string chords. I guess the mahogany top and rounded back is part of that. The craftsmanship is not bad. I filed the fret ends a bit, but that was it. Good playability. So ,these days, you actually get a musical instrument that speaks to you for 100 bucks...for this price, I can full-hearted recommend. It gets five stars for the sound mainly.
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u
Good enough to make you wanna play it & cheap enough to take on holiday.
ukmaori. 16.05.2022
Nice little travel guitar, with good acoustic resonance (for the money) looks nice enough to keep out on a stand so that I can play it whenever I want... and I don't need to worry about it getting dinged by the kids or a hoovering wife.
Sure it buzzes a tiny bit on the 12th fret of the top 2 strings (B&E) but it's just that fret & what an I doing up there on a travel guitar anyway?
Plus I will happily throw it in the boot on top of everything else when we go away on holiday... cos its smaller than my Dreadnought and it cost next to nothing!
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C
Will give you hours of pleasure
CarlosJo 18.02.2022
Easy to play, good sound, quality built, good looks too. It makes you just want to play. What more can you want! Oh ! the price. There, you can't go wrong.
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J
Great priced Taylor alternative
Jimwestham 28.11.2022
Bought this on a bit of a whim and not really expecting much. But I must say that I’m surprised by just how good it is.
It’s surprisingly loud for a small guitar and as a lovely tone to it.
It plays really well and gets a lot of use by me. Especially during the summer months when it’s played in the garden.
I thought that the v shaped neck would be a bit uncomfortable but I can’t say that I really notice it after playing for a minute or two.
Also comes with a great quality little gig bag as well.
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Harley Benton GS-Travel Mahogany