My Kanilea mods

joakiml

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A few years ago a got a Kanilea KPE-T. It is a very nice instrument but there are some things that has bothered me. While the nut width is relatively wide, the string spacing is not particular wide. The other thing is that the nut, saddle, and bridge pins are made out of plastic. Perhaps it doesn't affect the tone or play-ability of the instrument, but I would prefer having non-synthetic materials. Also, the tuners/machine heads on my model feels a bit "cheap".

So I decided to make a new nut with wider string spacing (31.5mm outer to outer string instead of 29.5mm) as well as a new bone saddle. I replaced the bridge pins with bone bridge pins made for a guitar, I had to file them down a bit so they would slide down long enough in the bridge.

I also replaced the machine heads with Gotoh UPTL. The old machine heads left some holes in the head stock which I filled with coloured wax (baowachs), and it turned out OK.

Attaching some picture for those that are interested.
 

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You've made a really nice job of that. The string spacing looks very natural.

John Colter.
 
Good idea. The first thing I did when I bought a Kanilea GL-6 earlier this year was make a bone saddle, albeit I haven't gotten around to making a new nut. The stock bridge pins are ebony so I left as is. It shipped with a factory installed pickup—Fishman looks like—but they didn't secure the wiring well. I spent a lot of time messing with the wires before I nixed all the rattles/vibrations. It's a Premium grade instrument too so you'd think they'd attend to small details better.
 
The old machine heads left some holes in the head stock which I filled with coloured wax (baowachs), and it turned out OK.

That's what's called making the uke your own. You did a good job filling those holes - not an easy thing to do.

EDIT: I did a search for baowachs, and I got: Did you mean: baywatch :D
 
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