Bongo with translucent wood finish

[madmax]

Hi,

I recently saw the 'Steve Lukather - Ball Family Reserve' advertisement with a wonderful 'Bahama Blue Burst' finish.

http://www.ernieball.com/site/flyers/lukebfr.html

Is it possible to get a MM Bongo with such a translucent (flamed maple) wood finish...? (Maybe as 2008s LE... ;-) )

Thanks in advance.

BR,
Markus

 

[mynan]

I'm sure someone will get right on that for you...

 

[adouglas]

LE...ain't gonna happen. LEs aren't special wood, they're special paint. Special wood is reserved for anniversary models and BFRs. And unless an unprecedented 10th anniversary Bongo happens, you're going to have to wait until 2023 for a 20th Bongo.

Trans finishes are not available on Bongos because the body is made of basswood, which doesn't look nice unless it's painted a solid color.

A BFR Bongo...that's a different story. I think it's a safe bet that the first BFR Bongo will be some special wood, but nobody knows what it will be. Maybe not even EBMM knows yet.

FWIW, all of the known special artist Bongos produced to date (the Open House Bongo and Dave LaRue's Mahongo) have been made of mahogany. I leave out the Flaming Biff Bongo because while Jack may be "special," if you know what I mean, he's not an artist.

I'd bet that the first BFR Bongo will be mahongany, as well. At least that's what I'm hoping.

 

[Moose308]

I believe is has been posted that having a flame maple top on a Bongo would probably never happen. This is largely due to the highly sculpted contours of the bongo. In order to get a proper maple top, you would need a very thick chuck of flame maple, and then grind it mostly away. Sort of prohibitive.

I for one would love to see a Bongo available in a trans finish. Mahogony would be fine. Good old ash is also quite fine by me. And a relatively common and cheap wood too (compared to flame maple that is.)

 

[meeder2]

I believe is has been posted that having a flame maple top on a Bongo would probably never happen. This is largely due to the highly sculpted contours of the bongo. In order to get a proper maple top, you would need a very thick chuck of flame maple, and then grind it mostly away. Sort of prohibitive.

I for one would love to see a Bongo available in a trans finish. Mahogony would be fine. Good old ash is also quite fine by me. And a relatively common and cheap wood too (compared to flame maple that is.)

I think EBMM could do a custom like this with the cutting equipment they have.
if you look at the detail of the inlays on the Dargies, you can see what I mean.
An Ash or maple or quilted ash would be nice. I don't care as long as its light in weight.

 

[Paul_C]

There was a sunburst (ash body?) Bongo, sold on ebay for the CLB Foundation, bought by Musicman Nut IIRC ?

P.

 

[adouglas]

There was a sunburst (ash body?) Bongo, sold on ebay for the CLB Foundation, bought by Musicman Nut IIRC ?

P.

Oh, right! I forgot about that one.

 

[madmax]

Sorry, but what does BFR stand for...?

 

[adouglas]

Ball Family Reserve.

Ultra-limited, ultra-high-end instruments. The basic concept is to make the kind of one-offs normally reserved for high-profile musicians available to those of us lucky enough to be able to afford them.

There's no specific recipe for a BFR. It's whatever the Ball family decides to make at the time. So far we've seen a BFR guitar that you could actually order, and a BFR bass of which only a handful were made.

Do a search on the phrase....