What's koa

[Kevin Briggs]

Sorry if this is a dumb question. I just am curious what it is.

[Bill Snyder]

A very figured tonewood. http://www.froggybottomguitars.com/images/materials/Koa.jpg

[sunburst]

Koa is a Hawaiian wood species, Acacia koa. It is not always figured, just as maple isn't always figured, but it is always one of the most beautiful of timbers, IMHO.

[red7flag]

I was told that Koa can be difficult to work with due to the toxicity of the dust. I was wondering if this is true.
Tony

[JEStanek]

This (http://www.kingbass.com/woodphoto.html) may help with tone woods and potential toxicities. Koa isn't listed there as toxic but I bet our luthiers would (wood?) know better than my Google search. Koa is beautiful and on my uke it is a pretty timber and timbre.

Jamie

[mandolooter]

I have quite a bit of experience working with koa (furniture, not instruments)and I've experienced no problems with toxicity. I've had more problems with walnut dust actually. It is one of the most beautiful woods out there, even with out the superb figure it can have.

[sgarrity]

Koa is a beautiful wood. But I've never played a koa guitar that I wanted to buy. They all seemed very average.

[allenhopkins]

A lot of the koa in Hawaii was logged off in the early part of the 20th century. As a result, it became rarer to find koa instruments; don't know if there was a restriction placed on logging or processing the wood (as in Brazilian rosewood), or if the supply just diminished.

Martin made koa guitars with the "K" suffix (as in D-18K). Koa was usually seen as a variant on mahogany. It's the premier wood used to build ukuleles, probably because it was the preeminent Hawaiian hardwood, and ukes are Hawaiian instruments.

A folk singer friend of mine, Anne Price, has a D-28KM Martin, the "Keb Mo" signature model. with koa back and sides. It has a wonderful sound. My Flatiron octave mandolin, model 3-K, has koa back and sides, and I have a Regal koa tiple from the '30's or so. "Curly" koa has an outstanding figure, and makes a beautiful instrument.

I think, by the way, that most reports of wood dust toxicity I've heard of, are associated with rosewood. True?

[cooper4205]

allen,

what exactly is a tiple?

[F5G WIZ]

Here it is: http://www.koa.com/ Sorry, couldn't resist. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[JEStanek]

Now I bet an Alcoa mando would just sound tinny...

Jamie http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif

[Greenmando]

I love working with Koa, it smells like barbeque sauce when I cut it.

I have a F5 I am building with Koa for the back, sides and neck. Using curly redwood for the face. I have a all Koa guitar, sounds great.

[Dave Hanson]

I have a Flatiron 2K mandolin, koa back and sides, sounds amazing.

Dave H

[Ken Sager]

I have a Martin 00-28k (koa top, back, sides) that I absolutely love. Koa takes longer to open up than does spruce and rosewood or mahogany, so I'd expect a good koa guitar would become a great koa guitar with play.

Love to all,
Ken

[red7flag]

I wish to apologize to koa about toxicity, I was thinking of cocobola.
Tony

[Greenmando]

I wish to apologize to koa about toxicity, I was thinking of cocobola.
Tony
No worries, all types of wood are toxic to a degree. I understand they will be talking about wood like asbestos in a few short years.

My guitar is a Alvarez, it is a beauty. I'll try and take a pic of it when the sun comes up.

[allenhopkins]

allen,

what exactly is a tiple?

A tiple (which apparently was originally pronounced "tip-lee," but usually prounounced "tipple" in the US) is originally an Argentinian instrument, I believe. It's like a large ukulele or a very small guitar, with ten strings, laid out in four courses of 2-3-3-2. The lowest pitched pair of strings are an octave apart, like a 12-string guitar. The two interior courses, of three strings each, are also in octaves, with two higher pitched strings on the "outside" of the courses, and a lower-pitched string in the middle. The highest pitched two strings are in unison.

Martin made tiples, with the "T" prefix: T-15, T-17, T-28 etc. I own a T-15, which is all mahogany, and the Regal koa instrument. Tuning is generally like a uke, G-C-E-A low to high, with the three lower-pitched courses tuned in octaves.

Tiples sound neat, like a baby 12-string. They do have big intonation problems, because of the short scale and the varying diameters of the octave strings (again, like 12-strings). If you're interested in hearing tiple used in a bluegrass context, some of the early Osborne Brothers & Red Allen recordings had Ray Edenton playing a rhythm tiple.

LATER: HERE'S (http://www.elderly.com/vintage/items/180U-216.htm) a Martin T-15 that Elderly had for sale.


Now I bet an Alcoa mando would just sound tinny...

Jamie

My Merrill bowl-back has an aluminum body, and except for a little metallic overtone, sounds like any other bowl-back. Of course it has a spruce top...

[Duc Vu]

My Flatiron octave mandolin, model 3-K, has koa back and sides
Do you have pictures you could share? Thanks.

[JEStanek]

I'll defer to the man with the long list o instruments on the tone of the alcoa mando! http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif

Jamie

[Eric F.]

Codeew, this isn't an octave, but it's a Flatiron 2K's koa back.

[Paul Hostetter]

Since it hasn't been mentioned, koa is the local Hawaiian name for Acacia koa (its scientific name), a relative of the bean. Compound leaves, rather weedy, the seeds look like beans. Magnificent tree. There are other acacias around the world that closely resemble it.

The tiple (tee-pleh) is a guitar relative indigenous to Spain and environs and much more of Latin America than just Argentina: Puerto Rico, Colombia, Mexico, Ecuador, Peru, etc. In its ancestral version it was a small five course single or double strung guitar that evolved from the Iberian vihuela. More here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiple).

Someone in the inner circle of Martin guitars brought one in to Martin after a vacation to South America to see if they might be interested in integrating it into their burgeoning ukulele line, and Martin took the five gut-string course and compacted them into four steel string courses, making a sort of bastardized ukulele variant which subsequently bore almost no resemblance to the real tiples. It hit their catalog in 1924, I believe. Modern tiples often have four, five and often twelve strings - four triple courses, sometimes six doubles, like a tiny 12-string guitar. It's a loosely defined instrument because it's found in so many places and has evolved so much in each of them.

Gryphon still has images of a typical nice Martin here (http://www.gryphonstrings.com/cool_stuff/Vintage_Gallery/Flattop_Acoustic/24418/24418.html). Here's another a bit like it:

http://www.gruhn.com/photo/UK0987.jpg

The saddle was a fret which meant these were maddeningly out of tune. I get the feeling Martin considered them a novelty side-product to the ukulele. But they did make some in koa.

[guitharsis]

Kevin Mathers built a all-koa steel string guitar that sounds great www.oldtimemandolin.com Wonder how an all-koa mando would sound?

[mandolooter]

Martin made quite a few all koa mandolins, I think MWH has one for sale still tho I haven't checked in lately. Its too hard not to start dreamin of how I'll raise cash when I start doing online perusing so I've tryin to avoid it. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif