Caoba Sonorida Cubana Bongo

[docarroyo]

I had listed a pair of Sonoridad Cubana bongos on Ebay but they didn't sell, I was surprized. So I decided to keep them, they sound good but they were painted blue and did not fit in with my taste of natual wood hues. I thought I would start by stripping the light wood on the inner shell to see what the wood looked like. Low and behold they are Caoba the grain and hue are unmistakable. What has me puzzled is that I belived these to be fairly recent but I know that Cuba has a prohibition of using Caoba on instruments. Does anyone know when this law was put in effect which would help me to date these. Here are some photos of the shells. If you double click on photos they will enlarge for better detail. The blue color is factory and I actually saw a set like this being played on a Cuban video but can't find it now.

[pcastag]

So, you still want to sell them for 175

[pcastag]

PS, Maybe that's why they painted them, to hide the madera prohibido!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCgHIAiScOk

Almost certainly those bongos are sonocs

[Mr. Conga]

Very nice natural wood grain, what did u use to strip the inside of the bongo, was that plasticaintthick?
i have a set of gon bops i have been wanting to strip to natural wood but the plastic paint is hard and to thick to sand off.

[docarroyo]

Yes They are Sonac thats the abreviation of Sonorida Cubana. The paint is very thick I used just regular paint striper and then the green pads in two different grades to sand clean. Then wet sand lightly. I have started today with the Macho and had great progress with it, its by no means finished but I can tell they will look great. The grains in the Caoba go from light to dark its supposed to be inconsistent in color and in my opinion its what makes it exotic and appealing to the eye. Heres a couple of photos of were they are at for those of you who want to see the progress. Its hard work but man its a labor of Love. The wood is wet from rinse.

[ABAKUA]

Not sure about this prohibition of Caoba in Cuba, I saw plenty of bongo, tumbadoras & bata made of Caoba while over there.

[docarroyo]

I was told by a friend that if the tree falls due to natual causes such as Huracanes etc its leagal to harvest for use. But it is a protected species as is Rosewood in Brazil. Caoba is also protected in Puerto Rico and many other Caribean nations. I also own a Bata made in Cuba which is made of Caoba it was presented to me in the early 90's and made in that time frame. The United States prohibits importation of certain species of endagered lumber unless it can be certified that it was felled by nature or that its old growth which was harvested before restrictions.

[Omelenko1]

The processing of Caoba stopped around the mid 80's in Cuba. Those drums Marcelo saw were made prior to that time. I know the Fernando Ortiz factory (where SONOC were made) stopped processing Caoba tumbadoras, bongos and batas. Cuban cedro and roble (oak) were used in substitution. My Cuban Sonoc quinto is Cahoba, was brought over from Habana by Guille Garcia, who played for the rock group Chicago in the 70's. Guille brought back 5 Caoba SONOCS, which at one point in time were all mine. I recently was able to retreive back the quinto, which sounds awesome and is somewhat heavy. I which I would have kept them all, now that Matthew is on the scene. I sold them because the humidity in Miami made the staves split and the glue (cola) used in Cuba is of a very low quality. Photo of quinto and of the 5 I had, sold them about 10 yrs. ago.

Dario

[Omelenko1]

Hey Doc,

Those staves on your bongos are a combination of Cedro and Caoba, with Cedro being the majority. When you finish sanding it and applying like 3 coats of varnish, is going to look beautiful. If you could have Matt do the hardware for you, it would be an ultimate bongo'. SONOC hardware is not up yo par.

Dario

[docarroyo]

Well They are done I happy with the end results, like I stated earlier I was going to sell them even though they sound great. The tone is PURA CUBA very old school, projection is great and they cut, slaps will hurt your tympanic membranes. They only thing that was trowing me off was the metalic blue paint not that it was bad but not to my taste. I decided to keep a bit of the Blue though the center block was not touched and the grooves retain a bit of the blue hue. I finished then with a gloss finish, I was going to use poly but opted for crystal clear acrlyic fast drying and great hard finish, but only time will tell hoe it protects. here some photos. At some time in the future I will change hardware but have to finish some other projects first.