NUD, custom Bruce Wei Arts spalted mango special.

KohanMike

Los Angeles, Beverly Grove West
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The custom spalted mango I had made by Bruce Wei Arts in Vietnam arrived yesterday. It is beautiful, and I think it sounds really good. It's a special design with no sound hole on the top, but small sound holes all the way around the bouts, plus a larger one in the cutaway.

It's solid wood all the way around, spalted mango top, headstock plate and binding, curly mango body, maple neck and ebony fret board and bridge. The tuners are Grovner open gear that feel very solid and precise. It has standard Aquila strings, which I will probably change to something else, like Worth browns or Living Water.

I'm going to have the action lowered and change the nut to spread the strings apart a bit. It cost $380 plus $65 shipping to Los Angeles, which took about 10 days, and Bruce threw in a hard case in appreciation of all the posts I put up and all the business I give him.

Here is a sound sample (forgive my rusty playing) and photos.

[video]http://www.kohanmike.com/uploads/Spalted mango sound sample.mp3[/video]

Spalted done montage.jpg
 
It looks incredible. What I would like to ask you for is a comparison between that ukulele, one of your other Bruce Wei ukuleles, and maybe that Kala (if you had someone else that would lend a Pono or KoAloha...that would also be interesting). I keep looking at some of his work on eBay...and those mandolin-looking ukuleles are sure beautiful!
 
In comparison; my Kala solid cedar top, acacia koa body cutaway electric has a little more projection and sustain, and I've compared the Kala to the $1000 K brands, the Kala comes really really close to them. It's probably the best buy there is out there.

The new spalted compared to my other BWAs; it's brighter than the mandolele (which has a natural deeper tone), has a little more projection than the brown burst I bought off his eBay store for $100 (which is pretty good itself with Worth Browns), and my gypsy jazz has the least amount of projection and sustain but nice tone. I think his ukes are well worth it, off eBay or custom.

I had him make a custom mandolin style a couple of years ago, glossy black with pearloid binding to which I added a tailpiece and extra fret markers.

Mandolele black finished 700.jpg
 
Mike, that thing looks fantastic. Congrats bud on a great new instrument.
 
That Uke looks great but I wonder why you decided to place the biggest sound hole in the cutaway? Isn't that the worst position? Its not a monitor for the player nor is it angled towards the listener?
 
Very interesting. What is the lighter wood inside the sound holes ......that in turn have holes in it?
 
That Uke looks great but I wonder why you decided to place the biggest sound hole in the cutaway? Isn't that the worst position? Its not a monitor for the player nor is it angled towards the listener?

It was an accident of miscommunication, the one I orginally saw had that sound hole on the upper bout like normal and no cutaway, but when I sent Bruce the specs and asked to include a sound hole in the cutaway, my thought was one of the small rectangular sound holes, but when he sent me the finished photos, it turns out he thought I meant to move that sound hole to the cutaway. One of the drawbacks to long distance contact and also with someone that English is a third language. After all is said and done, it sounds good and adds to the uniqueness.
 
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Very interesting. What is the lighter wood inside the sound holes ......that in turn have holes in it?

It seems to be a thin piece of veneer with little cloverleaf and bird like cutouts. That's what attracted me the design originally.
 
After using this uke the last few weeks and changing the strings to fluorocarbons, I'm very impressed with the sound quality and build. It's quickly becoming my favorite uke, it might even surpass my Kala.
 
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