Happy birthday next week; enjoy your day! Regarding your t-shirt, I've seen a few comments from you on Ukulele Underground. That forum, as well as your website, are so helpful for beginners. Just this morning, I was reading your article on relative tunings. I'm trying not to be scared to try a different tuning on my sopranino from Mim's, but if I leave it on C, at least Mim says it sounds good there. Thanks for this review.
Awesome! Thank you! Playing with tunings is a lot of fun and a lot easier than people think. I actually believe different instruments can suit different tunings - in all the scales - you tend to find one that really makes the uke resonate the most.
I found the ultimate solution for the quiet A string. I changed the pickup thinking that might improve the problem. It didn't. I put a shim under the pickup on the A side to see if that would ameliorate the issue. It did, but only by a little bit. It also threw off the intonation (I had made a bone saddle and nut and intonated perfectly). Finally I realized that the stock as well as the replacement pickups weren't aligned with the overall string spacing. It differed by just a tiny bit, about 2-3 millimetres. This is probably true for most undersaddle pickups put in this model. The cause is that the hole for the wire is drilled to close to the centre line. I widened it out to the side so I could push the piezo toward the A side so that it would better align with the string spacing. I put a tiny piece of bone next to the piezo on the G side to stop it from sliding toward the G side. I plugged it in and the A string is picked up perfectly. All strings beautifully balanced! 😊
I loved this instrument. I forget wether I set it up or not, but I usually do. I had the same problem with the quite A string, which I took care of by cutting a little piece of feeler gauge and placing it under the piezo at the A string. My issue now is that it slowly drains the battery even when left unplugged at the uke. I'll probably install a cut-off switch somewhere to take care of this unless I hear of a better solution. Good review as always.
Happy Birthday next weekend! Rest up and enjoy your day! Interesting uke and cheap enough. I guess what can you expect for $77? As you said, a bit of tinkering and you might have a winner for a very low cost.
Hi, Barry, thank you for another great review! And happy birthday - enjoy it! About quieter "a" string - I ordered Flight Antonia concert and it came with the same issue. Shop staff examined another 3 instruments left (from the same series) and all of them were not correct with piezo. So I returned the uke. Later I learned that the reason was wrong position of pickup under the bridge (probably very easy to fix at home). As you can see, it may happen even to rather trustworthy brands. Best regards, Michał
Absolutely it can - piezo's are notoriously fiddly to set right. My point is - a real uke dealer would have tested this, realised that the pickup needed work and sorted it (or not sold it in the first place)
£75 right now, with £8 shipping. Tempted, it's my birthday next weekend too and I haven't treated myself to anything yet, although a Gretsch Resonator catches my eye. I don't mind a bit of tinkering, I've had some practice so that doesn't frighten me. My problem is, I just can't imagine anywhere that I would use it. Off for a ponder! Have a great birthday!
That is a great price, which leaves some money to pay for a good setup. And it looks pretty decent. It would be good for a first foray into solid electric ukes. Great review!
Thanks for the proper review. I bought one and love it - well, after making a few changes: 1. 'A' string very quiet: moved piezo a good 5mm down by drilling a new hole for the cable, unplugging from PCB and re installing. Hole has to be at a bit of an angle as you'll find out. Initial attempts of 2-3mm didn't help. 2. Distortion when strummed loud (at all volumes, plugged into anything): Fitted 500 K ohm resistor across pickup. Best place is to solder on rear of PCB behind socket that pickup plugs into and hotglue to protect from vibration. Sound now extremely clean and crisp. Initially I tried a 1M ohm resistor but it wasn't quite enough attenuation for mine. 3. Battery drain of 9mA at all times: not resolved yet, it needs either a new switched volume potentiometer wired to the battery (50kohm, log), a microswitch behind the jack socket, or another switch installed somewhere. For now I have a small piece of cardboard I use to insulate a battery terminal when not in use. Otherwise battery will last approx 2 weeks. Other suggestions welcome as I haven't made this happen on mine yet. 4. If 'dead on arrival': I thought mine was, until I noticed a plastic insulator in the battery compartment which needed removing...
Wow, that is excellent advice! I just returned the Harley Benton uke to Thomann because of the same issue. I will receive another instead and am grateful that I now am able to fix it. Thank you very much, TheLaughingdonkey!
I have the solid body version with the cut outs for £109 and love it for the simple reason I can play it anytime of day or night with headphones and not annoy anyone in the house or the neighbours which is a must considering I'm still learning to just sound passable to anyone who wouldn't know much better.
Great review Baz. I have a Harley Benton CNT bought from the same place. 99% of people buy an electric uke to make some noise. I got mine because I can strum and give it some welly and get there muscle memory and no-one in the house can hear me. I practice every evening and I'm not waking up kids or disturbing the peace. These electric ukuleles really let me practice. And a total bargain I have my eyes on the snail you reviewed earlier. If you were to ignore amps and purely focus on playability, which would you pick?
Hard question to answer - for me (just because I worked in guitar shops and can sort this) I''d grab this. But the vast majority of readers of mine are not au fait with setup. I'd steer them to the Snail.
Happy Birthday. Excellent review. Harley Benton makes good mostly inexpensive guitars but ukulele not so much at least for now. Perhaps like other companies they might be treating this as a toy or novelty than as a serious instrument. It is not as pretty or sound as good as the Flight or the Risa electric ukue's. I agree with you that its simplicity makes it cute and attractive. I love Maple necks. However, it seems like it needs a lot of tinkering to get it set up to be playable. A buyer will definately need to replace the pickup. With solid body or even a acoustic-electric uke's the pickup is the most important part other than the quality of the amplifier one is running it into. My vorson sounds better. I eventually ended up just putting the DiMarzio Pro Track which is a blade style pickup on the bridge for now after a bit of carpentry work done by Guitar Center who installed it for me. It is a good all-around pickup that sounds like a vintage PAF humbucker in the size of a single coil.
I don’t think it’s fair to compare this to ukes like Risa - very different beasts - ditto the Vorson. I like the plain ukes myself and the wood grain here is lovely.
Electric ukes are just not for me! I don't hate them, I just don't have an interest in playing one. Many obviously do and more power to their collective elbow. I love the look of this though and who wouldn't like the price? Great and interesting review, as usual. Have a great birthday, hope the sun shines and the cake is big enough, to hold all the candles 😜 Thanks mate, have a good one!👍
I find it very strange, that Thomann didn't send you a fully set-up instrument. They have 3 workplaces only for gitars; 2 in shipment and 1 in their store. (they have in totall 169 people working for set-ups, repairs and maintenance for the various instruments they sell.) Strange.. Have a nice break and a Happy Birthday. 🥂🍾 Enjoy!
Happy Birthday ! Have you made a video on basic setup techniques? I was thinking of this uke. It’s a perfect uke for showing what the owner can do to make it better. Light filing for fret ends, trus rod adjustment ext…. Just wondering.
There's a video in the beginners tips section on adjusting saddle height. I've kept off doing a video on the nut because it's incredibly tricky and much harder to reverse. Fret ends would be a good video i'll consider doing. Truss rods? Meh - no need for them on ukuleles whatsoever! Never understood brands that fit them. Kamaka have been building some of the greatest ukes on the planet for over 100 years - none of theirs have truss rods.
I had opportunity to test one of the cheapest Harley Benton ukuleles with pick-up and noticed, that the pick-up sound was very well. But I noticed, that isn't a thing for me in general.
I baught one of these . Slightley different as it has a line out and a headphone jack from Thomann 2 years ago. It did need a setup ,but for the price I expected that . I got it mainly to play at night and not desterbe the the good lady n kids sleeping .I allso wanted to try it through the peddle board and I'm not dissapointed . I did find Thomann's a pleasure to buy from . They delivered within 4 days from Germany and sent text messages each day as to the progress of the order. I recentley baught a guitar from them and recived the same excelent service except the guitar is perfect and actuley arrived in tune lol. For the prices they charge relative to the quility I find them unbeatable .
I am not a fan personally of electric ukuleles, that said it is a good looking instrument and surely not over done. I think the fact that these electric type ukuleles are selling are a testament to the future of musical groups and the the fact that you will start to see Ukuleles fitting in with many different styles of music again. The sound is electric and a bit muffled …yea no A! …Another good review over all. Thanks ….DOC
@@GotAUkulele very cool I think it is great that it is making a comeback. I think a ukulele sounds great with guitars in groups. Must have been fun for you!
@@GotAUkuleleYou were right. It's an improvement but not by a lot. Oh well, I'm satisfied for the time being. I bought it because ut was easy to install without any soldering. I had to solder another wire that had come loose so I should have just bought a better pup from the start, solderless or not.
I'd pay the extra for Snail. I'd rather focus on playing the music than tinkering with making the instrument sound or play better. Hope yea a Great Birthday Break!
