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Mahogany vs korina junior: what say you?


Travis

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Posted

What are your opinions and why?  I get they can both sound amazing for different reasons. What are your reasons?  Weight doesn’t matter to me. I’m talking sound. What up..?

Posted

The korina has the usual, upper mid spike of most limba solid bodies. I preferred the korina junior for live use, it cut through. 

Posted

I’m not particular...I’ve had both. Both sounded great...Hog on an 80s Gibson Jr and Korina on a 2000s Special Jr Korina. The Hamer played much, much better.

But both sounded just great.

Posted

With all else being equal, I'm partial to good ol' Honduran mahogany over Korina.  With Korina, I hafta wonder whether I'm actually paying extra for the wood, or the name/history/reputation/mojo, because it's not particularly rare.

Posted

Yes to both!  I kept the BCR Jr. (hog), but it took me a year to finally let go of the '05 Korina - that one was sportin' a most wonderful chunky neck.

Both came to me with Lollars, and both sound amazing. Splittin' hairs really.

Haven't tried any other brands of Junior, but these were my springboard drug to a '66 Gibson SG Junior, a '76 Greco Firebird-I and a Robin E-type.  Never thought I'd like single pickup guitars this much, but they tend to get the most play.

CP95ei5.jpg

 

Posted
2 hours ago, crunchee said:

With Korina, I hafta wonder whether I'm actually paying extra for the wood, or the name/history/reputation/mojo, because it's not particularly rare.

Yeah, very true. I call korina, “The Big Con-job.” The mystique built around this hardwood because it was used on the original Vs/Explorers...meh, big whoopdeeDOO.

I dig limba because it is usually lighter than mahogany, is attractive and has a sonic quality I like. Still, I don’t think that warrants the associated price tags. It’s all marketing. 

Posted

For me Korina is lighter weight and lighter color than the Honduran. Not sure that any sonic difference isn't pickups or hardware. 

Posted

I don't necessarily agree with the difference in weight as I've had Mahogany that's both light and heavy and Limba that's both light and heavy... I think it's where it's cut from each tree or the age, moisture content or density... I dunno, Limba perhaps may have a ever so slight edge in lightness... I prefer the tone of mahogany as it seems a little darker... NO, strike that last comment... I just played my Korina Standard & V and they both totally RIP!!!.. that said, both Mahogany and Korina are excellent choices... Final answer 😆

Posted
18 hours ago, Steve Haynie said:

I recall Kim Keller saying that korina could be bought easily enough, but finding korina that did not split was the hard part. 

Dave and I rejected truckloads of that stuff.  It would piss everyone off but it was necessary.  The Korina had a tendency to check, had streaks (a no/no for Hamer), and had a lot of wormholes.  IIRC, it was about the same cost per board foot but the waste was astronomical.   Before the tree huggers get crazy we didn’t throw it away.....we sent it back for other companies to use on stuff that cost way more than the Hamers.

i have a Korina Standard and Vector and a mahogany Jr.  I like them all.

Posted

My korina Standard from the 1995 run has some weird figuring in one spot, and a very tiny bit of filler.  It played so great when I got it that I could not put it down. 

Posted
2 hours ago, mirrorimij said:

   Before the tree huggers get crazy we didn’t throw it away.....we sent it back for other companies to use on stuff that cost way more than the Hamers.

 

This is just so funny. I laughed out loud.

Posted
14 hours ago, Dave Scepter said:

I don't necessarily agree with the difference in weight as I've had Mahogany that's both light and heavy and Limba that's both light and heavy...

Maybe I should have put in a qualifier that the last few korina guitars I’ve owned were lighter than their mahogany counterparts (Junior, Vector, Bacchus V, Navigator Expl). 

The second Hamer I purchased waaaay back in the 90s was a low number korina Standard. Great guitar, but had to weigh at least 10lb! Brutal. Here it is in ‘99 at Slims SF, strapped on way too high:

C9584A4B-A0F4-453B-BD40-AF97345DD0EE.jpeg

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