Which Kalas are solid wood?

I've been offered good prices on Kala ukes, and I'm seriously considering a tenor. It's not clear from anywhere I can see which have solid tops, however - are the curly mangos all solid, or is it just veneer?

It is a laminate. Very well made and has a fine sound. They are also quite loud. If you consider the price on a Kala mango its a real bargain. Kala makes nice solid mahogany, acacia and lacewood ukes if you are looking for solid. Oh yes the spruce tops are great. I can't fault the Kala line at all lammy or solid. Solid tops on spruce topped mahogany lam. 2 of the koa lams. have cedar tops and the beautiful spalted maples are solid spruce topped as well. In the same price range Ohana and Mainland ukuleles which of course can be found at (shout out) ukerepublic.com

Yeah, I was definitely considering the Ohana cedar to before (maybe the cedar and willow, if they did that in tenor), but the discount on Kalas I've been offered is hard to resist.

SamWise said:

I've been offered good prices on Kala ukes, and I'm seriously considering a tenor. It's not clear from anywhere I can see which have solid tops, however - are the curly mangos all solid, or is it just veneer?

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I have the basic Kala Tenor. (KA-T)

It is most definitely a laminate, but out of all the Kala Tenors I tried at the store (they had multiple solid spruce tops, etc) I liked it the best. (Main reason being it had a great action and the intonation was spot on) The sound is incredible; for a 120 dollar instrument and to me the sound difference in the Kala models I played was not as proportional as the price.

The Kalas that are solid wood have "AS" in the name. Like the solid mahogany tenor is called KA-ASMT. Those ones sound really nice.

Oswegan said:

The Kalas that are solid wood have "AS" in the name. Like the solid mahogany tenor is called KA-ASMT. Those ones sound really nice.

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btw there is one on e-bay for 208 which is well below msrp. Not sure how much shipping is though.

Samwise, you could put on a good show at the Green Dragon with that Kala Mango tenor. They do laminated ukes well. So put your feet on a settle and grab a flagon, and serenade your friends at the Green Dragon.

Pippin