NUD Flamed Mango Guitalele by Pelem Ukulele

Jim Hanks

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NUD Flamed Mango Guitalele by Pelem Ukulele

http://www.pelemukulele.com/guitalele.html

This should be my last NUD for awhile - unless Romero Creations puts out a mango TT6. That was basically the inspiration for this one. I still think that would be a great instrument, but after one didn't materialize after Romero's first run of TT6s, I went looking for alternatives and ran across this builder in Indonesia. There is very little out there about Pelem Ukulele other than their web site and a few YouTube demos. So this was a bit of a gamble, but as the cost was reasonable, I decided to roll the dice.

Here are the specs:
17" tenor scale
46mm nut width
Top/back/sides/headplate - flamed mango
Fingerboard/nut/bridge/saddle - rosewood
Neck - mahogany
Geared tuners
ADGCEA tuning with black nylon (?) strings

Here's an image gallery:
https://imgur.com/a/wPTMbTh

Pros: pretty wood, tidy build, sounds good, low instrument cost
Cons: flat fretboard, nut sticking, strings meh, high shipping cost

I'm withholding tonal judgements until I try some more strings. I'm not a big fan of the black nylons that came on it. So far, the sound is pleasant, if a little muted, but I'm really thinking (hoping) clear nylon, or better yet probably, fluorocarbons, will bring out some chime from this mango. We'll see. But in the meantime, here's what it sounds like out of the box:

 
A few pics

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It looks lovely! I can see what you mean by the stock nylons being a bit muted. I look forward to hearing how your experiments with other strings work out!
 
That looks wonderful and has a sweet sound. I really like the headstock logo being minimal and etched like that, and the soundhole rosette looks very "tactile" as Baz might say.

Huge surprise to see your name on the label inside and I think it's a nice touch, and seems not common these days.

Also looking forward to your observations with different strings too.

Thanks for sharing :)
 
There might not be much in the way of chime, Jim, but it has a lovely sweet and mellow voice over my headphones. That finish looks really tactile as well. Nice!
 
Huge surprise to see your name on the label inside and I think it's a nice touch, and seems not common these days.
Yeah, I was surprised by that too, and TBH, I'm not sure how I feel about it. :p
Yes, it's a cool custom touch, but what happens if I need to rehome it at some point. :confused:
 
Yeah, I was surprised by that too, and TBH, I'm not sure how I feel about it. :p
Yes, it's a cool custom touch, but what happens if I need to rehome it at some point. :confused:

I totally understand that.

I'd consider it to be the special "Jim Hanks Model", and the new owner would continue your legacy of creating great music.

I dont play any 6-stringers, but if it were me as the next owner, and since I am a fan of your music, I would consider the name inside as a badge of honor, but I'm weird like that I guess. :)
 
Yeah, I was surprised by that too, and TBH, I'm not sure how I feel about it. :p
Yes, it's a cool custom touch, but what happens if I need to rehome it at some point. :confused:
I don't think it will be a problem. I've owned a couple of Mya-Moe ukes with my name on the label...……...which didn't seem to effect resale.
Very interested to hear what the sound is with some decent strings.
 
I dont play any 6-stringers, but if it were me as the next owner, and since I am a fan of your music, I would consider the name inside as a badge of honor, but I'm weird like that I guess. :)

:rofl:
you're sick, man
(choose your own definition of "sick" - Webster's version or the 2019 version)
:rofl:
 
Congratulations Jim on a fine looking and unique instrument. I found the fingerpicking tone very pleasant, it was warm, mellow and sweet, particularly for A-A tuning.
 
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Congratulations Jim on a fine looking and unique instrument Jim. I found the fingerpicking tone very pleasant, it was warm, mellow and sweet, particularly for A-A tuning.
I agree with the stock strings the strumming sounded a little muddy. I just put on a set of D'Addario EJ45LP tonight so we'll see how those sound in a couple days.

Out of curiosity, Jim, what did you use for recording?

Zoom Q8 video camera with the built stereo mic capsule. Then I edited the audio in Cubasis on the iPad. But minimal processing - the plugin chain was:
Brusfri(room noise reduction) -> Waves Audio Track (just for high pass filter) -> FabFilter L-2 (limiter - to bring level up but no compression except tickling the limiter in loudest spots). (Of course YouTube adds it's own compression but can't get around that.)
 
I'm interested to hear what strings you recommend for guitalele in general. I currently have Pepe Romero/La Bella strings on mine and they are fine except that they wound strings are ultra-squeaky (although with a bit of time and playing they seem to be settling down a bit).
 
I'm interested to hear what strings you recommend for guitalele in general. I currently have Pepe Romero/La Bella strings on mine and they are fine except that they wound strings are ultra-squeaky (although with a bit of time and playing they seem to be settling down a bit).

On the baritone scale, I really like the T-I CF127 set in Terz (G to G). They should be good for A to A tuning on tenor scale but I haven't tried them there. I also had a "reentrant Terz" tuning on the tenor Kala that I gave to my daughter. It's nice because you can do it with no wound strings with readily available strings. I think I did reentrant Terz on baritone too but it had at least a couple Southcoast strings no longer available.

I'm glad you mentioned the Romero set as I had thought about that for this one. I was wondering about the squeakiness. That's too bad. Fresh on, the EJ45LP have more squeak than I'd like, but maybe they'll settle down.
 
On the baritone scale, I really like the T-I CF127 set in Terz (G to G). They should be good for A to A tuning on tenor scale but I haven't tried them there. I also had a "reentrant Terz" tuning on the tenor Kala that I gave to my daughter. It's nice because you can do it with no wound strings with readily available strings. I think I did reentrant Terz on baritone too but it had at least a couple Southcoast strings no longer available.

I'm glad you mentioned the Romero set as I had thought about that for this one. I was wondering about the squeakiness. That's too bad. Fresh on, the EJ45LP have more squeak than I'd like, but maybe they'll settle down.

I'm using the CF127 set at A - A on a 17" guitalele. Can recommend!
 
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