SX 6 String Banjo

Grave Bomber

Ghoulish Anomaly
A buddy of mine bought one and hasn't been playing it much, so I borrowed it for a few days.

Blarg!

You know, it looks pretty nice. Decent if not obviously cheaply done bound neck, nice star inlays, great looking wood even if it is a laminate.

However, it has poorly finished fret ends, comes stock with acoustic strings, and the bridge is way too high for decent action, fixing would involve sanding it down by a good 20% and re-slotting it, and honestly, the stock slots are too small for the strings being installed right off the bat. Tone is really not that great either comparing it to some 6 string banjos that are a few hundred more, this one sounds thin and plucky( yeah, I know it's a banjo :tongue: ) with no bass presence or wholeness of sound that the ones that are in the 3-500 range have.

So...if tempted by a cheap 6 string banjo, i'd stay away from this one. The setup can be fixed, and the frets worked on, but the tone just isn't there.
 
SX stuff is interesting. Some of it, like my dirt cheap bass, are pretty good. Some of it are not even worth the pennies they cost to buy.
 
I've had a great SX bass and an even better SX Tele. Every acoustic thing from them I've tried has been a complete piece of garbage.
 
Banjos are different than guitars; I don't know if some of these bargain companies realize that. I have heard bad things about both the SX and the Dean 6-string banjo; you seem to need to move up to a Gold-Tone or Deering to get something half decent. Luna makes a 6-string banjo, but I expect it is much like the Dean.
 
The newer Fender "Rustler" 6 string plays and sounds great, but it's kinda plain looking. It's nice for $400.
 
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