This is the story of my $60 Kamaka white label concert. I list many (but not all) of its flaws. Don’t take this as complaining because I am well aware that every indignity inflicted upon this instrument brought it closer to my price range. I’ve played it virtually every day for the two or three years I’ve had it. It’s my favorite instrument I’ve ever owned. Its story is one of triumph over adversity.
My first uke was an inexpensive Lanakai tenor. Set up by HMS way beyond its price point. Played it exclusivly for three years. I knew I wanted a better ukulele but I couldn’t afford one. So I started to check ads trying to find one that was all beat up so I could get it at a price I could afford. I checked local craigslist every single day for over a year while also checking the forum and a couple of other places. Finaly one day I saw an ad on craigslist for a beat up quality tenor uke so I called the guy and arranged to go look at it.
It turned out to be a Kamaka concert, not a tenor, and it had multiple low humidity cracks all badly repaired or not repaired. It had two unrepaired cracks on the soundboard from the lower edge almost to the bridge. The guy said his kid had stepped on it. The worst crack on the front started at the edge of the lower bout and went to the edge of the waist. Apparently the wood fell off in two pieces. A one and a half inch sliver of wood is missing from the edge of the lower bout. Whoever tried to fix it so that there wasn’t a hole at the edge had cheated over the long piece at the lower bout to waist. The two pieces had apparently completely fallen off and the remaining long piece cheated over so that it would cover part of the missing wood. This resulted in the piece of wood still missing and the crack not being tightly repaired because it had been moved.
I’ll skip the back and sides.
Then there was a bad case of banana neck. The neck also has a bit of twist to it.
I turned the uke this way and that to inspect all the damage. I didn’t know if I could see it all because it was the dirtiest instrument I had ever seen. It looked like someone played it out in the hot sun for years while eating candy bars. According to the seller it had lived in first Arizona for many years and then in Utah for years. He didn’t seem to know anything about humidity and thought it was maybe the hot whether they had gotten to the instrument.
I had read about Kamaka on the forum I knew they made first class instruments so I thought this could be worth it if somehow it could be made playable. Otherwise I would’ve just walked away.
So as I’m examining it I’m tweaking the creaking friction pegs trying to get it into tune with open strings. After a bunch of tweaks I tuned up the last little bit, gave it a strum, and knew I had to buy it.
First job was disinfecting and applying 0000 steel wool to remove the gunk so I didn’t mind touching it. From my reading on UUF I was able to come up with a repair plan that I could tackle. First thing was getting the saddle down to barely peeking up from the bridge. This put the action into a playable range but completely depowered the uke because the break angle of the strings over the saddle to the attachment on the bridge was almost flat. It was now time for power tools. One thing I had going for me was anything I screwed up would be lost in the whole mess. So I took a drill to it and converted it to a strings through the top bridge. As soon as I got that done and tuned it up it had all the power it needed and I was ready to start learning to play a ukulele which had a banana neck with a twist.
Eventually I adapted. I really love this uke.
I am not attaching any pics out of deference to this proud instruments feelings.
Here are the links to a couple of original songs written and recorded with my $60 Kamaka white label concert.
Old Car Smasher https://soundcloud.com/jeffuku/old-car-smasher-1/s-JUgaPCZwYVj
Now More Than Then https://soundcloud.com/jeffuku/track-133-now-more-than-then-1/s-IBQrDWyCINk
I added pics later in this thread.
My first uke was an inexpensive Lanakai tenor. Set up by HMS way beyond its price point. Played it exclusivly for three years. I knew I wanted a better ukulele but I couldn’t afford one. So I started to check ads trying to find one that was all beat up so I could get it at a price I could afford. I checked local craigslist every single day for over a year while also checking the forum and a couple of other places. Finaly one day I saw an ad on craigslist for a beat up quality tenor uke so I called the guy and arranged to go look at it.
It turned out to be a Kamaka concert, not a tenor, and it had multiple low humidity cracks all badly repaired or not repaired. It had two unrepaired cracks on the soundboard from the lower edge almost to the bridge. The guy said his kid had stepped on it. The worst crack on the front started at the edge of the lower bout and went to the edge of the waist. Apparently the wood fell off in two pieces. A one and a half inch sliver of wood is missing from the edge of the lower bout. Whoever tried to fix it so that there wasn’t a hole at the edge had cheated over the long piece at the lower bout to waist. The two pieces had apparently completely fallen off and the remaining long piece cheated over so that it would cover part of the missing wood. This resulted in the piece of wood still missing and the crack not being tightly repaired because it had been moved.
I’ll skip the back and sides.
Then there was a bad case of banana neck. The neck also has a bit of twist to it.
I turned the uke this way and that to inspect all the damage. I didn’t know if I could see it all because it was the dirtiest instrument I had ever seen. It looked like someone played it out in the hot sun for years while eating candy bars. According to the seller it had lived in first Arizona for many years and then in Utah for years. He didn’t seem to know anything about humidity and thought it was maybe the hot whether they had gotten to the instrument.
I had read about Kamaka on the forum I knew they made first class instruments so I thought this could be worth it if somehow it could be made playable. Otherwise I would’ve just walked away.
So as I’m examining it I’m tweaking the creaking friction pegs trying to get it into tune with open strings. After a bunch of tweaks I tuned up the last little bit, gave it a strum, and knew I had to buy it.
First job was disinfecting and applying 0000 steel wool to remove the gunk so I didn’t mind touching it. From my reading on UUF I was able to come up with a repair plan that I could tackle. First thing was getting the saddle down to barely peeking up from the bridge. This put the action into a playable range but completely depowered the uke because the break angle of the strings over the saddle to the attachment on the bridge was almost flat. It was now time for power tools. One thing I had going for me was anything I screwed up would be lost in the whole mess. So I took a drill to it and converted it to a strings through the top bridge. As soon as I got that done and tuned it up it had all the power it needed and I was ready to start learning to play a ukulele which had a banana neck with a twist.
Eventually I adapted. I really love this uke.
I am not attaching any pics out of deference to this proud instruments feelings.
Here are the links to a couple of original songs written and recorded with my $60 Kamaka white label concert.
Old Car Smasher https://soundcloud.com/jeffuku/old-car-smasher-1/s-JUgaPCZwYVj
Now More Than Then https://soundcloud.com/jeffuku/track-133-now-more-than-then-1/s-IBQrDWyCINk
I added pics later in this thread.
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