Electric guitar for kids

dubber

6 year old is showing an interest and wants a guitar, I see squier and Ibanez do small size guitars, does anyone have any experience or suggestions?

crunchman

The Harley Benton (Thomann) ones are good.

My daughter bought one of these with her birthday money last year:

https://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_st_mini_bk.htm

That one is 22 3/4" scale.  There are 19" scale ones around, but they don't tend to be so good.

I'd also definitely go fixed bridge like that and avoid a trem on a short scale guitar.

Avoid the old Encore ones second hand.  They are total rubbish.  Also avoid the Gear4Music own brand ones.  Some friends bought one for their son.  I had a look at it to try to set it up better, and I couldn't intonate it properly.  The bridge was in the wrong place.

The Squier ones seem to be good, but they are pricey compared to the Harley Benton.   Don't know much about the Ibanez ones.

Thomann do have a lot of options on short scale guitars:

https://www.thomann.de/gb/shortscale_guitars.html

I'm sure that other retailers do as well.

JezWynd

Have you considered a Pignose? On board amp and speaker, full 24.75 scale and well made. Lots of fun, he’ll constantly be hassling you to give it back to him.

Kalimna

Both the squier anx ibanez are great little guitars  - have played both when in a simillar situation, but owned neither (i ended up making a pair for my boys).
From memory, the ibanez had a better feeling neck and fretwork, and is the one i would have gone for.

Adam

lysander

Bought the Harley Benton strat small scale for my kid’s 5th birthday, it’s great, can’t go wrong with it ( although as always some bad ones can occasionally split through QC ).
As recommended by a reviewer I put 11-52 strings on it to tune it to normal pitch and it stays in tune well despite the small scale.
Took about 90 minutes to setup including tidying up the nut for the larger strings, quite amazing how good it is for 50 quid. 

Kalimna

Another vote for heavy strings - i thought i was doing my boys a favour (they were 7 and 5 at the time) with 8's initially. Far too loose and not-in-tuneable. Moved to 10's, but to be honest the 11's which are on now are great, and the tension isnt *too* high, because of the shorter scale, so ok for younger fingers.
Adam

dubber

Thanks for the replies, I'll check out all of the suggestions. Glad to see things have moved on since I started!

Arjailer

We got a Squire Strat Mini for our son when he was about 7-ish. Was a great wee guitar once I put heavier strings on it and set it up   

Those Harley Benton ones look great for half the price of the Squire 

Whitecat

In your guys' esteemed opinions is a 24" scale still too long for most kids 5-7ish?

crunchman

Whitecat said:

In your guys' esteemed opinions is a 24" scale still too long for most kids 5-7ish?

I think the 22" (or thereabouts) scale is probably better at that age.  Like I said above, I'd steer clear of the 19" scale ones though.  They are too flappy unless you want to tune higher than normal pitch, or use very heavy strings.

Whitecat

crunchman said:

Whitecat said:

In your guys' esteemed opinions is a 24" scale still too long for most kids 5-7ish?

I think the 22" (or thereabouts) scale is probably better at that age.  Like I said above, I'd steer clear of the 19" scale ones though.  They are too flappy unless you want to tune higher than normal pitch, or use very heavy strings.

Thanks!

thegummy

Jackson do a cute model called the Dinky Ninja or something like that.

I was going to get one for my niece but the guy in the shop said that at 10 or 11 she might as well get a full size one.

ICBM

crunchman said:

Whitecat said:

In your guys' esteemed opinions is a 24" scale still too long for most kids 5-7ish?

I think the 22" (or thereabouts) scale is probably better at that age.  Like I said above, I'd steer clear of the 19" scale ones though.  They are too flappy unless you want to tune higher than normal pitch, or use very heavy strings.

This. Don't go shorter than 22.5" - the standard Fender 'short short' scale. Unless your kid is huge for their age a 24" scale (the standard Fender 'short' scale) will probably be too big though.

A guitar with a trem is OK if you set it up with the bridge tight to the body, otherwise they do tend to cause trouble.

dubber

thegummy said:

Jackson do a cute model called the Dinky Ninja or something like that.

I was going to get one for my niece but the guy in the shop said that at 10 or 11 she might as well get a full size one.

I showed him a few pictures and he picked out a Jackson Rhoads! 

thegummy

dubber said:

thegummy said:

Jackson do a cute model called the Dinky Ninja or something like that.

I was going to get one for my niece but the guy in the shop said that at 10 or 11 she might as well get a full size one.

I showed him a few pictures and he picked out a Jackson Rhoads! 

lol dunno if it would be wise to go with one like that that he picked on a whim, can't imagine it being too comfortable to practice with

dubber

thegummy said:

dubber said:

thegummy said:

Jackson do a cute model called the Dinky Ninja or something like that.

I was going to get one for my niece but the guy in the shop said that at 10 or 11 she might as well get a full size one.

I showed him a few pictures and he picked out a Jackson Rhoads! 

lol dunno if it would be wise to go with one like that that he picked on a whim, can't imagine it being too comfortable to practice with

... but he'll look good in a leather jacket and shades playing through a cranked Cornford!

rocktron

thegummy said:

Jackson do a cute model called the Dinky Ninja or something like that.

I was going to get one for my niece but the guy in the shop said that at 10 or 11 she might as well get a full size one.

It is a Jackson Dinky Minion JS1X. They come in 5 colours, including black.

Available from Andertons. and several other guitar stores.

Also Ibanez do the GRGM21M Gio Mikro short scale guitar.

Check YouTube for demos.


Here is the demo for the Jackson Minion:-  

The opening riff is by Don Dokken, song  titled Stay. The guitarist is John Norum from the band Europe. 

rocktron

Correction: 

Sorry, the opening riff in the above Andertons demo is by Bryan Adams. The second riff is by Don Dokken.

agibbo

Another vote for the Harley Benton mini guitars. For the money you cannot go wrong!

musteatbrain

I bought my 7 year old a Jackson Minion for their birthday. It’s really pretty good. Needs heavier strings on to really stay in tune, but it sounds great through a Marshall stack. The frets have no sharp ends, but I did have to file the saddle screws and the screw heads on the jack socket as they were sharp and could easily cut little fingers.

I’m quite happy noodling away on it when it gets left out. 

I’m pretty confident I could gig with it

Vibetronic

I've got the Ibanez mini Paul Gilbert guitar that I lend out to younger students. Really nice little guitar, +1 to heavier strings though. Another of the kids I teach has a small Squier which is fine. At that age they don't really know or care about the brand or look - it's a guitar so it's cool - so if I did get any more to loan out I'd probably go the Harley Benton route. (I got the mini-PG for myself to mess about on but it didn't quite work out that way!!)