Big question: Mango vs Mahogany

Fergs

I would certinly agree that the design of an instrument has the largest impact on its sound but builders defenitely feel that the wood has a sound that is particular to that wood.

The following is a link to a builder that attempts to rate the sound of the various woods he uses.


http://www.myamoeukuleles.com/gallery.html

Those are some Sweet Uke's I got to meet them at the Denver Ukefest very nice folks at Mya-Moe's.

Had quite the talk about wood's and bracing and such, He took quite alot of time to explain to me about how the grain patteren make the biggest differences in a given type/thickness of wood.
Using the pebble in the pond theroy, a pebble on a non windy day will make a great wave patteren on the water surface but pick up the wind and you lose the clearity very quickly.
A wood with lots of grain changes losses the crispness of sound wave travel, like the Birds Eye Maple I was asking about, lots of tiny knots to disrupt the sound patteren.
He told me most of the pretty woods don't make for great tops.

I played his all Mango Tenor against Palm Tree all Mango Tenor and WOW what a huge difference and not just in sound the woods didn't look anywhere near the same.

Both builders Uke's sound and played fantastic I wood love to have either or both.

Wish they would have had that Purple Heart Uke to see in person and WOW that Lap Steel Uke what a sound!!!!!

i have the kala mango tenor and i think it sounds great. as for temp i dont know how it would do in extreme cold. i live in san jose and the coldest it gets here is in the 30s F

Just a tip about keeping your ukes healthy. The worst thing for them is wildly fluctuating humidity. Temperature isn't the culprit as much as humidity.
My shop is kept at a humidity in the mid fourties throughout the year (same with most builders I know). It isn't cooled in the summer or heated (except when I'm in it) in the winter.
The easiest way to protect it is with one of those humidifiers that you put in the sound hole. Also just wrap it in plastic wrap if you are going to be traveling with it to a different climate.

fergs1 said:

personally I feel the construction has more to do with the sound with the exception of maple which always sounds tinny and scratchy too me.I think the most important thing to do is to try each uke out in a store and forget all the disection of wood types and just listen and compare side by side.
cheers fergs

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This is great advice if one has the luxury of living somewhere where the ukulele is big. (Hawai'i). LOL. For the rest of us there is MGM and other online venders and UU for other folks advice. It gives us excuses to keep buying ukes.

fergs1 said:

personally I feel the construction has more to do with the sound with the exception of maple which always sounds tinny and scratchy too me.

The only things I would say with confidence is solid wood sounds better than lams and extremely lightly built ukes tend to respond better and have greater projection than heavy built ukes. The catch is the very light biult ukes usually cost more
but as with anything you get what you pay for.
cheers fergs

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Maple/Spruce instruments are a wonderful combination. Bright, crisp, clean, but, as you stated, depends on the builder. They can be very sweet instruments as well, and have some complex tones once they break in. Unless of course, you're talking about Maple tops, which for the most part, I agree, with the exception of Rick Turner, who does great things with Maple Tenors. Short of Milo, Maple is my (and my clients') favorite. Oddly enough, seems to match James Hill as well.

Generally, lams are a cheap way of building. However, there are some builders (like David Hurd) who incorporate laminations in his build. I also know of a recent factory custom that has a laminated back - super resonant. I'm not particular to laminations, but they're out there. These are higher end instruments, of course. Which, as stated, you get what you pay for.

haolejohn said:

What kind of mango uke did you decide to go with?
You really aren't risking anything except your savings because once you get this mango, you are going to want to get a mahaghany and then a koa and then a spruce and then a cedar and then a (place wood type here).
UAS is uncurable.

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It's a Kala uke, but it doesn't say what's the model.

NaturalBornCamper said:

It's a Kala uke, but it doesn't say what's the model.

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Look inside the sound hole and check the model. We can figure it out from there

generem said:

Look inside the sound hole and check the model. We can figure it out from there

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I hasn't arrived yet, it's an order haha!

thejumpingflea said:

The wood is Nato.

It is a Greg Bennett UK50

http://www.gregbennettguitars.com/uk50.html

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That's some nice job! Thanks for finding all that info.
It looks like he's only playing two chords on the video however. On the CD it sounds different

deach said:

Both. You know you'll end up with both sooner or later.

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Ha ha, I'm reading this thread three years later (having just done a Google search for Mahogany Vs. Mango at Ukulele Underground) just to see what you all would say. About a week ago I came to your conclusion. I'll want both. :drool: (After saving up some $, of course). Now it's a matter of soprano or concert.

beautifulsoup said:

Now it's a matter of soprano or concert.

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ha ha...that's an easy one too....

BOTH.

(touche!!!!)

eugene ukulele said:

ha ha...that's an easy one too....

BOTH.

(touche!!!!)

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Yep, I set myself up for that one! :cheers:

Well...since this thread has been resurrected...

I now have two very nearly identical sopranos, one mango and one mahogany. Both are Mainlands made in the same production run, owned only by me and for approximately the same amount of time, strung with identical strings, and with about the same amount of play time on them. I.e. they are about as identical as can be expected, other than the wood type.

They both sound great (and both love heavy fluorocarbon strings) but are very distinctly different. Both have very clear voices and are quite loud (they were louder than many ukes even before I put the heavy strings on). The mahogany has a very meaty, mellow tone while the mango is very noticeably brighter. Harmonics are bell-like on the mahogany vs. chime-like on the mango. I guess I would describe the mango as having a tone closer to traditional Koa ukes, and it is actually a bit brighter than my only Koa uke (that one is a longneck soprano with a concert scale and a slightly larger body though, so it's hard to make a direct comparison).

I can't really say that I prefer one over the other. I've been drifting toward picking the mahogany up more often but I think that is because allergies are killing my voice so I've been doing more ballads lately. I would be very loathe to lose either of them and there are certain songs where I definitely prefer the mango.

If I ever get around to getting a decent condensor microphone I'll make some A/B audio samples and post them somewhere (not on YouTube - by the time they mangle and compress the audio you're lucky to be able to distinguish between a tenor and a soprano, let alone fine nuances between two nearly identical sopranos). In-camera mics and even my SM58 and SM57 don't really do justice to acoustic instruments - for a really meaningful A/B test of acoustic ukes you need really flat response, low noise, and wide dynamic range. I tried doing samples with the SM58 and SM57 and, while you could clearly tell the difference between the two ukes, I wasn't satisfied that the microphones really picked up all of the subtleties.

Finally, I've had a couple of people ask why I went to heavy strings on these two ukes - especially since they were pretty loud with standard strings. These are my first sopranos and I found I just never cared for how light and mushy the strings felt. They sounded great but both the stock Aquila strings and the medium fluorocarbon strings that I put on just felt too soft - it felt like my fingers wanted to catch on them and get tangled up. When I got back from UWC I ordered another spool of Seaguar leader and went to the heavy fluorocarbon strings and got tension closer to what I am used to on my other ukes and the added benefit of the ukes becoming "cannons." I also tried a set on my KoAloha longneck soprano (concert scale) and couldn't take them off fast enough - on that uke they really pinched the sound. All this goes to illustrate that you really need to experiment with different strings on ukes and not just go with a "one size fits all" formula.

John


John