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Thomann selling Harley Benton basses as 'Decoration only'


Annoying Twit

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LP. Been a while since a bass went up. [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_l_450plus_cherry_burst_deko.htm"]http://www.thomann.d..._burst_deko.htm[/url]

EDIT: Gone within 30 seconds or less. It's really getting to a state of having to buy instantly or many items are gone. I owner if putting an instrument in your shopping basket reserves it.

Edited by Annoying Twit
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I accidentally left my laptop running all night. It seems that at some ungodly hour of the morning (I would guess) a whole load of dekos went up and then disappeared again. Including a five string 'progressive' bass. And what appears to be the most expensive HB instrument that I've seen, the acoustic guitar "Harley Benton CLD-30SCM-CE SolidWood". I don't remember seeing that in the product list before.

I'm upgrading my program so that I can check when things are seen. But, I'm wondering exactly what times of the night people at Thomann are working and uploading new Dekos.

Did anyone see them go up?

Edited by Annoying Twit
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There was also a flying v copy. [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_fv430bk.htm"]http://www.thomann.d...ton_fv430bk.htm[/url]

And one of their LP copies, the L500 being near or at the top of the Harley Benton LP copy range [size=4][url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_hbl500bk_egitarre.htm"]http://www.thomann.d...bk_egitarre.htm[/url] At £116, still a low end LP price wise.[/size]

[size=4]And an acoustic: [/size][size=4][url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_hbjc503ceq_nt.htm"]http://www.thomann.d...jc503ceq_nt.htm[/url][/size]

And finally a short scale strat. [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_ms_jr.htm"]http://www.thomann.d...enton_ms_jr.htm[/url] That only costs £36 for the proper version. I wonder how much the deko copy was.

There's a bug in my program. It is supposed to record in a file the time that any new instruments are noticed, and it didn't :( EDIT fixed now.

It does seem rather odd that these go up in the middle of the night. Perhaps it's a database thing, with updates of new instruments scheduled then when the site is relatively quiet.

Edited by Annoying Twit
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At least something went up last night. There's now a left handed B-30 bass available which wasn't available yesterday. I woke up at 5:30am, but went back to sleep. There was a very cheap classical style guitar for £10, but I didn't think it worth a post. I'd guess that other instruments went up at 4am or so, but that was all that was left by the time I looked. I'm going to have to look into how I can track what's happening even when I'm asleep. This will probably mean another program running on a server at work to get 24/7 coverage.

EDIT: Ah, I think it's the right hand B-30 Natural bass that's reappeared in the list. Wasn't there someone who was interested in the B-30 but didn't want a black one?

Edited by Annoying Twit
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I've just taken a punt on the natural b30. Think they went up at around 1am. Yes I did set my alarm :P
There is a photo of the b30 that appears to show a fracture on the heel, I have access to cnc machines so could make a plate if it's unstable. Guess it's just a case of assessing it. Also states that it's unreturnable, but for £43 with postage from Germany, it's surely worth it, for curiosity as much as anything.

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It's a "D" stamp on the heel. They put that on so that people can't return the Deko items as full price items. (E.g. buy both a deko and a normal one, and return the deko in place of the normal one). I think it is very unlikely that the neck is unstable.

While they say it's unreturnable, as you purchased it online you can always return it for a refund under the consumer contracts regulations. [url="http://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/regulation/consumer-contracts-regulations"]http://www.which.co....cts-regulations[/url]

Edited by Annoying Twit
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It isn't a bass, but I thought I'd give a brief update on the Santos Series C-40SCE Deko.

Seemed to have a few dings on the body (splinters of wood rattling around inside), but cosmetically ok, looks nice.

At least one of the frets wasn't fully down. I decided to try a preliminary set-up - the neck was fairly flat (with a very faint kink in the wrong direction) so tried to adjust the "two way truss rod" to give a slight bow - this seemed in fact to only offer adjustment in the direction I didn't want, and ended up succeeding in only removing the nut from the end of the truss rod. Given the neck pretty flat this wasn't fatal though, so I tuned the strings up to pitch to see if it might help and it is more or less playable.

I'll try and record the sound, interested to hear what the fishman sounds like.

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@JazzyYama. Thanks for the info. I was quite curious about the Santos Series acoustic. But given what you write, I'm a bit put off. If the truss rod doesn't adjust as it should. While that might be what makes yours a 'deko', I'm considering the possibility that it's part of the design of the guitar.

I'd like to hear the sounds, both mic'd up and DI'd. I don't know if anyone saw that hippie naturist couple on The Voice, but his acoustic guitar sound was a case study of precisely the sort of acoustic-electric pickup sound that I don't like.

@KB - there used to be more dekos going up during the day or at 8pm. They seem to be moving to more and more unusual times. I wonder what the reason for that might be.

The B30 Natural acoustic bass dekos seem to have sold out. It's good that one of us got to order one.

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@AT

I remember last month you posting round about 9pm when dekos showed up on your software,they used to show at 8/9am too.
Can't fathom the timings either.

I'm only really interested in the HB-60 and they're not listed anymore,the ebay one is a collection only from Tonbridge.
Why did he not list it last December,I was working there for a week :)

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Well, I finally got round to doing something with my Deko. The neck was garbage, so that's gone in the parts bin and I've thrown on one that's off an Aliexpress 'Fender' which is a little better.

It's quite a looker now and the body is REALLY good, nice weight and great grain.

I should point out that I'm very much NOT the luthier, the neck wouldn't quite fit and I didn't have such tools as a file or sandpaper, so I just stood on it until it went in. Job done. I reckon I could get a job at Fender with that level of technical skill?

Anyhoo - it's together, working and I'll take it for a spin tonight at rehearsal to see how it sounds.

[attachment=183087:FullSizeRender.jpg]

Cheers,
James

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