My crazy drum kits!

drummerboyfitz

Senior Member
Here is a link to my blog. It's a museum (of sorts) for all my crazy drum dreams! Whenever I want a new kit, I start thinking about things I haven't seen before and try to make it so.
http://crazydrumkits.blogspot.com
Enjoy! Feel free to leave comments here, including new ideas! I'm constantly looking for new challenges.
 
Great blog! I love restoration threads and franken-kit threads. I have a few questions and one suggestion for you:

How did that 28x9 bass sound? I've been thinking of getting a shallow, large diameter bass drum just to mix it up a bit at gigs. Did it still have nice
oomph" or did it lack character because of the depth?

One thing I'd love to see documented is taking one of those longer smaller diameter bass drums and slicing it down. After much pestering I've finally got my drum guy to agree to this and now I see a whole world of possibilities for people like myself that are looking for more traditional sizes but don't have the cash to fork out for custom or vintage kits.

I'd love to see you get your hands of one of those trendy sized OCDP, Gretsch Catalina mod or DDrum kits with say a 20x20 bass and wrap finish and slice it all down and re-finish it to look old. That would be a beautiful thing.
 
The 28X9 was unruly sounding to say the least - it was originally a marching band drum. I had to muffle it with a lot of egg crate foam just so you could hear the rest of the kit. I never had to mike it at gigs - it was crazy loud. I've cut down a few bass drums to make smaller ones and the warmth of the tone always suffers. I'll do pretty much anything to a drum and there isn't much I haven't tried. My next experiment is going to be square drums with no heads. We'll see what happens...
 
I've been having trouble posting pics to the forum... that's why I've been updating my blog and posting links to it. Any assistance in posting pics would be appreciated - The site keeps asking for an image URL and I want to get them from my hard drive. Help?
 
The snare drum is a Remo Buffalo Drum - very inexpensive ($39 from Musician's Friend) and it's supposed to be usd for drum circle type applications. I screwed a set of Puresound 20 strand wires into the shell, cut off one end, then duct-taped the loose ends to the underside of the shell. I thought it would sound like crap but it doesn't! It sounds fantastic - super dry and crisp. No throw-off, so it's a full time snare. It weighs about 1 1/2 pounds and is weatherproof. After 7 months of playing, the head looks brand new - not a mark! (The head is Fiberskyn.) I originally intended this as an experiment, but it sounds so good I use it as my full time snare. Also, eminently hand-playable - no rims to hurt you! The 'rim' sound is decent - woody and clicky, it could be better though. All in all, a great little drum and easy to make.
 

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One stand to rule them all...

Well, here it is. One Stand To Rule Them All!
I used a cymbal stand, stuck a tom holder in it,
clamped a snare basket to it, clamped a cymbal boom on,
and voila! One stand.
Also posted at my blog:
http://crazydrumkits.blogspot.com
 

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The Little Monster

The Little Monster! This kit is a 12" X 10" Peace tom with a snare basket mounted on top. I screwed some angle irons to a wooden box and then attached a piece of wood to the angle irons (to clamp the kick pedal on.) I had to cut down a cymbal stand to about 4 inches long to slide into the tom holder on top of the tom, which I then slid the snare basket post into (basket post was too narrow for tom holder.) The tiny bass drum is tuned wide open and not muffled. I'm delighted with how great this little monster sounds. The snare is, of course, my Buffalo snare, but any snare can be used. The hi-hat pedal is a tiny little kids hi-hat that matches this kit perfectly. The whole thing is 27" high by 12" deep by 15" wide, making it officially the smallest kit I've ever built.
 

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Very cool...got any videos of you playing these kits? Would like to hear them in action!
 
Nice stuff.

I usually have a project going too. Some work good - some not so good - ha ha. But they're all kind of fun.

I like the pic of the big and small bass drums together. Big contrast.
 
Looking for crazy drum kits to add to my blog. If you've built something crazy and want to share it with our community, email me at [email protected] with pics and a description, including how you built it. Sound and video clips welcome too! Please only submit kits you've actually built yourself. I'd like to see some of your crazy kits on this thread too! Crazy Drum Kits! Check it out.
 
Hi,Drummerboyfitz!
Very cool design! you're using drumstick or Vic Firth "Rute 505" nylon stick for this drum?

Peter - I'm using regular drum sticks - a Vic Firth 7AN. The drums came with mallets and I use those for quieter playing. The heads are Remo Fiberskyn so they are super tough. I used the 14 inch as a snare drum for almost 2 years and there isn't one mark on it.
 
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