Harley Benton Electric Guitar Kit Extreme-84

Arrived in a few days, well packed. The assembly instructions was in german (but you can download the english one)
The wood pattern is very beautiful on mine so I've deicided not try to paint it.
Assembled in a couple of hours without difficulties, was a lot of fun. Setup also went smoothly. Equipped 10-46 Elixirs instead of the bundled strings.
1st impression: Wow, that's a decent guitar. Neck is comfortable, the body is light (but doesn't feel cheap), the neck dive doesn't annoy me.
Sound is decent, a bit more noisy on high gain compared to a ZW set (81/85). I'm using with a PC (2i2 gen4 -> AmpKnob or other VSTs).
1-2 weeks after:
- I've got grounding issues. Apparently filing the paint from the string holder the solved it. Still a bit more noisy in hi-gain than a 81-85, but still rocks
- Although I take good care of it, the horns seem fragile, maybe the wood is too soft. Maybe it should be varnished
- Still happy with the guitar :)

It arrived very well packaged and i sanded off the finish from the front of the guitar body and stained it a very nice red color, I chose to leave the sides and back unpainted because the wood color is very nice, assembly took about an hour and a half and the wires were not marked like the photos, the manual was in German so i had to use a translated one on my phone, had a lot of buzzing problems and adjustment but finally it sound great. Beautiful guitar nice sound, a lot of noise when using high gain. Quality is 3 stars just because of the wires not being marked and the manual being horrible, otherwise this is a nice project and a nice final product.

I've always loved Explorer guitars but they are so expensive. The Harley Benton Ex-84 series looked cool and I almost bought the white one but then decided to get the kit instead.

Everything went together smoothly and didn't need any extra sanding, drilling, or cutting.

It came ready to paint and I tried to paint mine to look like a Viking shield, which was fun to do. Now I have a unique looking Explorer for the fraction of the cost of a real one.

I don't know anything about electronics, so that part of the project was most daunting. Luckily you don't have to solder and only snap together things. With a little trial and error I got it working quickly.

As for the guitar itself it sounds and plays great. This is my first guitar with active pickups and it is great for metal but also fine for other genres too. Then isn't super thin but isn't super chunky either.

There were a few slightly sharp fret edges, but that is not uncommon for budget guitars and is an easy fix.

Overall, I'm super happy with this. I'm glad I went with the kit instead of getting the white one since now I get a one of a kind guitar. It was a fun project and easy to do.