Upgrading a Harley Benton Fusion III

This is a video where I take an already excellent budget guitar (the Harley Benton Fusion III HSH Roasted in Bengal Burst) and upgrade it with high-end Gotoh bridge and tuners, an aftermarket brass block (37 mm, to allow the recessed cavity cover to fit back on), GraphTech string trees, and a set of handwound humbuckers. I also rout a cavity in the front to allow the trem to float, finish and polish the frets, and install a Tremol-No system.

One thing I don't mention in the video is that I also had to enlarge the tremolo cavity a little to fit the Gotoh. this meant widening the opening for the bridge on the top and taking some material out behind the block to allow free movement. I just used a standard Strat template for this.

The pickups I wound are about 8k in the neck (49.2mm spacing with AlNiCo IV and AWG 42) and 12.5 in the bridge (53 mm spacing with AlNiCo V and AWG 43). I also made an iron baseplate for the Roswell single coil in the middle position.

This is the first in a series of upcoming videos where I do modifications on these guitars. At the end, I will do a video where I compare two modified HB Fusion IIIs to one in original condition, see what the differences are, talk about the costs involved, and, finally, say whether I think which modifications - if any - are worth doing.

By the way, the jazz vamp at the end is (loosely) based on a recent video from Jazz Guitar Chords. You can find it here:

   • Minor Blues Jazz Guitar Vamp in the S...