Weckl: the Big, the Bang and that ageing Boom

Racman,

Sound and wood are generally the main influences. I've never constructed a small kit. They've all been big sets and for the most part the concept sets - square shells, all ten inch depth, or 8" depth, or half-toms/bass have just been ideas based on certain ideas I have of sound. I don't think I have played a traditional depth floor tom in more than a decade, save for the one set I put together from component drums while living in Texas. But even then the trad. depth was just one 16x16 off to my left. On my right the floors were hung. Although the green stained set had three 18" depth floors, 14, 16, 18, and a 20x20 on the left, left over from a square shell setup. That has happened with most of my sets. Something from a previous set gets thrown in to the next one.

I still have concept sets I would like to make. One is a set with a 'wood rainbow,' meaning the drums would descend in wood grains light to dark, say English Sycamore to Ebony. But the cost of veneers would be a king's ransom and lots of waste, depending on what veneer supplier I used. Another is a set where the smallest tom would be the deepest, say a 6x12, and the shells would get more shallow as you go around the kit. People think shallow floor toms would be kind of wimpy but not at all. They sound much more musical to me. Deep floor toms can throw off such low frequencies you can barely tell the difference between them, especially playing faster fills. The shallow depths allow the tones of the heads to be a little more prominent. Which was the obvious reason manufacturers went more shallow after the DIYers already went there.

I also wanted to make a stave shell kit out of pine or spruce with grains running vertical. That idea is based around stringed instruments like violins, which use spruce. Very light, very resonant. My first stave snare drum was a 6x12 pine just to see if I could do it. Came out pretty cool and really pops. It's 3/4" thick, though. I made others, figured maple, which are an inch tick. They sound like tanks. Never heard snare drums with such tremendous backbeat. Not my sound, but in a studio, for certain types of music they would be really good.

Most of the times the constraint of funds has kicked in and I worked with what I could afford.

If the economy picks up I may start my own shop and do something fairly unique in the custom market. Has to be because of the saturation of makers. There are so many eye-candy custom makers out there it's incredible. Many, the majority, went under. I got into this in 1991 when the DIY industry was just picking up steam. A bunch of us were on Drummaker.com forum and we just picked apart the subject, and wrote an online book for newbies, etc. Now there are over a dozen parts suppliers of shells and hardware for DIYers. Plenty of wrap suppliers and veneer suppliers. Web sites galore. DVDs. This one is probably the best DIY site for info : http://pdgood.us/drumshed/

If I had the funds to work with I would do some really interesting things. Of course, you never know what you have until you're done, and sometimes you have failures on your hands. But you never know until you try. Most DIYers just stick to conventional set-ups and are very happy with what they end up with. The custom makers try to outdo each other with finishes. Some are so outrageous it's stunning, literally. I really don't know where they can go from here. Now, with computer graphics, the sky is the limit for wraps. As the price comes down and the materials get thinner and stronger more and more players will be using wrapped drums I am certain. For me I like wood grains for the most part because of natural variations. Exotic veneers aren't inexpensive, but it isn't bad when you just make a small kit. The 4 pc has come back as the main contender for so many genres now. Making your own 4 pc maple or birch set is substantially less than purchasing high end manufactured sets. Making a three piece with a manufactured snare even less expensive, though all kinds of metal shells can be purchased now, plus acrylic shells. It's all out there.

I have grown very fond of shallow bass drums. I used to use a 10x26 which played so nicely. Was in the 10" depth kit. My previous set had a 20x22 and I just could not get used to all that extra air sluggishly moving between batter and reso head. The 11 and 12" depths I have now play really nice for me. They sound good on the recordings, too, which was a relief, but I knew they would. The main thing for me was feel. Even with the reso holes and homemade port tubes they still have solid feel and quick response.

Man, I guess I wrote a book here. Sorry about that.

"God's bow of promise" Kit.... I am totally in love with this work of art
set of drums.... How could you possibly NOT have this any longer????!!!!

50 lashes!!!!

Visually, I'm not into the half size drums. However, I have heard the toms
with this configuration and they sound simply killer!!! Wicked attack and
awesome resonance and sustain... Wouldn't care for the short bass drum
though. Gotta have the punch and depth of sound.

Don,

Yeah, I know. The rainbow kit was really beautiful. Two overall problems for me. The sound of the smaller toms, 8" depth was too punchy compared to larger toms which had more head to head interaction and more sustain. Second, as mentioned, the 20x22 bass was just too mushy feeling and sounding for me. What convinced me to go back to a more shallow kick was playing on someone's 14". Belongs to a set a renovated, and recorded with last year. I just loved the wallop it had. Going super shallow was just the idea of keeping every drum in the math spectrum. And it worked out very well, especially the 24," but they both sound nice. The port tubes really added some low end which the mics pick up nicely.

Third, of course, every single drum crackled terribly. That hurt. Not sure why. Just didn't cure correctly, I guess. I really dislike lacquer. If I had done oil, my usual, the rainbow set would still be up. But, I am happy with what they became. The leather set has a unique look, as well, my favorite sound and feel, and all is good.

I AM going to make another rainbow set someday. The color is just too much to not have again, though I will not use the Eucalyptus veneer. Too many hard spots which effected color saturation.

I would not be so unwise to daebate with one as wise
as yourself, Asaph but it sounds like at least a few of
tese sound issues could have been rectified with top
and bottom head experimentation.... No?

And what do you mean by "Crackle?

Don, it's the sound between SNAP and POP .................




Had to do it bro, too tempting ! LOL


Luv ya ! TED

Don, it's the sound between SNAP and POP .................

Har, har, Ted!!!

"Making your own 4 pc maple or birch set is substantially less than purchasing high end manufactured sets."

Asaph

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I've always wondered and more likely that there are various types or grades of maple that have been used, especially during the 80s' when everybody lusted after having a maple kit. After all, the greats played them and they sounded great with the aid of studio enhanced environments...every body was sold. About 8 years ago I bought into the maple craze but my pocket book was not able to afford it. But I did find a deal from a Canadian drum manufacture called, Ayotte. Remember them? I'm sure you do and probably know more than I do. Anyway, the day it arrived I had it set up next to my friend's Tama Classic (Japan series) Maples that cost him an arm plus his neck. His mother has never forgiven him for that purchase ha! The sound of those drums are incredible. My Ayotte that cost half the price of what he payed for the Tamas was a different sound all together. My Ayottes sounded so much 'less' in terms of depth, resonance and projection. I later discovered that there are indeed differences in the kinds of maple timbre and surely would dictate the quality of sound projection. But it was a lesson well learned. In less than a year I did get most of the money back when I sold it practically new. I learned that if a kit sounds good without mics around it, than more than likely it's going to sound great having them mic.

Rac

Don, I only use Evans resos and Attack single ply clear for batters, so head experimentation will not render better tones for me. If I got too much punch with that head combo, any other would just render more punch and not enough sustain for me.

Crackle is just cracks in the lacquer - dozens of hairline cracks in the finish on every drum. My drum room is not terribly climate controlled so variations in temps and humidity must have effected the curing process. I never noticed until I had the 6" tom away from the set one day and had my glasses on. I was shocked. Looked at the rest of the set, every drums crackled. I was pretty bummed out and there was no way I was going to try and redo. So ...

Next time it will be Tung Oil.

Racman, many years ago I stopped into Drums in the Wind traveling through Indiana. Going into the drum room unfolded kits from just about every manufacturer out there. I started at one end of the room and tapped on the toms of every set. I was fairly unimpressed (given price tags compared to my own drums) until I came to the Ayottes. The tones were so musical and warm and delightful I was VERY impressed. The only thing that was different were the maple hoops. From that moment on I determined to someday have maple hoops. Finally got some.

Ayotte went through some changes to stay viable. I don't know. I can tell you Canadian rock maple yields as fine a tone as any wood can. I have read that Japanese maple is somewhat softer than north American maple. I doubt enough to make for any well-defined differences. Having heard Tamas numerous times, up close and personal, I've never heard anything that distinguished their sound from any other maple product.

Sometimes it is as simple as the size and weight and placement of lugs on a shell. Ayotte developed a unique lug unlike any other at the time. Did yours have those lugs? Perhaps you had a lesser line of Ayottes? I doubt a top of the line Ayotte kit cost half what a Tama kit did back then. Ayottes were Rolls Royce priced back then. I really don't remember what they had for later lines, but they did go the way of DW and have a kind of lower Pacific line, as I recall, but frankly having heard top of the line DWs in various situations, I have never found them to be any better in sound than anything else out there.

Shell depth, heads, proper tension, and mounting are top priority for me.

Rac, It could have been and possibly was a number of
variables in that circumstance between yours and your
friends kit. Heads, tuning baring edges, shell size... and
yes, it could have been the wood itself. But I say this
because I have a Tama Starclassic birch and a ddrum
Dominion maple kit. Both of these are mid line sets that
I paid under $900.00 for and they sound as good as any
thing I've ever heard.

The double bass PDP kit that you see me playing in those
youtube clips are a hybrid of inexpensive woods, one of which
is pine of all things, and you heard how those sound. there
were no mics on the drums either, what you heard was from
the mic in the camera only.

So I'm a firm believer that you don't have to spend 3, 4, or 5
grand to get a great sounding set of drums. Now what you
WILL get spending that kind of money is top quality hardware.
But That's of no consequence to me since all my kits are made
from a hybrid of hardware anyway. I know for a fact though
that you can get yourself a killer set of drums for somewhere in
the neighborhood of 7 to S800.00 if not less.

Racman, one thing I have learned doing some recording recently. First, in watching the Steve Smith on the couch video I also looked around at other Smith youtube vids. He's been playing Sonor for decades. One video stood out to me of a solo he did at a drum festival when he was in Journey. "One" tom was so poorly tuned and a mic too close to it's sound field it drove me crazy and for all intents and purposes ruined what he did musically speaking, for me. Drove me nuts. Boing, boing. Great Sonor drums. Poor sound.

The recording work I have done in the last year started out with a set of Argent drums. The guitarist asked me to record at his house. Said he bought a set of drums off a friend who told him they were good drums. I never heard of them for good reason. They're a beginner's line. Totally bottom end drums. I knew it as soon as I looked at them. In tuning up, the lugs on the 13" tom broke. Left me with a 4 pc. The 6 lug chrome snare was THE worst snare drum I ever placed sticks upon. The heads on the kit were Emperors - definitely too thick a feel and sound for me. The pedals were a beginner's Yamaha single kick and hi hat. Problems with both. But, I did what I could by way of tuning, we messed around with mic placement, a little patience with the pedals, a touch reverb in the mix, some EQ, and Voila! Tom got a pretty good sound out of those beasts. I'm just glad I brought my own cymbals along. That session will be our first CD. I do not believe drummers would ever realize it was played on a beginners line of drums.

Like Don says, more money = better hardware generally, and best finishes, but the drums themselves ... especially when recording or live, you can do wonders with the right heads, tuning, mics and board equipment, imho.

As it happened I took Tom's drums home and renovated the set with new bearing edges, new lugs, new heads, isolation mounts, some interesting mahogany veneer, and when he next saw them, and heard them he was very pleased and impressed. I also found him a really nice Mapex snare on ebay. Future sessions were recorded with that kit until we went back to my house and my drums. No one would ever know the set I played was a beginner's set.

The drums still do not have "my sound" because of the depth of the toms and heads on them, but overall they sound pretty nice.

Yes, Asaph!!!! Good point about the better finishes...
Which also makes a nice closing advantage for sales
with those multi thousand dollar beasts.