Harley Benton HBMA-100 VS

This is a beautiful instrument to behold and constructed to be a sturdy instrument. Upon receiving my Harley Benton mandolin I expected the usual quality I receive from Thomann. I have some minor criticisms about the mandolin, the strings are very high gauge and the action impossible to adjust as the bridge adjusters can not work as there is no where for them to move. I had to take my very pretty Harley Benton mandolin to a repair shop and ask for help. The shop said the mandolin was set up very badly but was easy enough to fix. They removed the strings and replaced with some 9-32 gauge strings, they had to drill holes through the bridge in order for the floating bridge to work correctly and then adjust the action accordingly.

After the repair work my Harley Benton mandolin works/plays fantastic. I should add this cost me an additional £25 so to any other people looking at this mandolin I will say yes it is a great instrument but expect to pay an additional cost because the instrument IS NOT set up to work very well out of the box. Yes it can be played out of the box but it will be very difficult to play because the strings are very hard gauge and the floating bridge is not correct.

I think Thomann may need to address this issue with the mandolin and with their supplier. Overall you have a fantastic product but I did not expect to have to pay £25 in repair work!

Best wishes,

Andrew Kerensky LLCM

Well, yeah, it's a copy allright, but please consider that the original cost 75 times the price and you will be pressed to find any other F-style copy for double the price you will pay for this one. Finish and details on the instruments is flawless.

I am not a full fledged mandoline player (rather guitarist) but picked this up for our bluegrass band.

Only point of criticism is that mandoline came shipped with the bridge in place and under tension. Luckily it held up perfectly, so this goes to show. But as you have to take of the bridge to remove the protecting foam, it would still be safer to ship it with the bridge not installed, or under slacked tension.

Most importantly is that the instrument intonates perfectly after you do a proper installation of the bridge (check some youtube videos if to find out how to do this). Playability is great, even up the neck. Tuners are holding up fine and not slacking.

A incredible instrument for the price and perfect choice for beginners who have fallen for the sexy looks of the F-style mandoline.

I was quite happy with my purchase,i had read all the relevant reviews on the item and so had prior knowlege that it would need a small amount of work done,particulary the bridge,which was pretty poor in its fitment,I have to say though,the mandolin i recieved did not have as many problems as to some i had read about in the reviews,no sharp fret-ends,and the binding was good,no slippage on the machine heads either.If i had one negative comment to make ,it would be the instrument arriving under tension and rattling around in the box,otherwise it seems good value for money,plays nice and bright,the strings are not "heavy" and of course it looks fantastic,