I recently picked up an aluminum in walnut from Lonnie Mabry, near Canton, GA. Unfortunately for out-of-staters, he does not ship. It is black aluminum, and I suppose it is anodized rather than powder coated. I have been running one of strikers with synthetic tip on it, and holy mackerel does it sound great and is easy to use. I put it in the hands of a kid and he made it sound great too. It's hard to beat an experiment with aluminum for $25.