RIMS killers

Les Ismore

Platinum Member
Cool, someone finally brought a simple solution to RIMS mounts on the market.

Gary Gauger demonstrated this fact back in the 80's when he released a pricy, heavy, space intruding devise called the RIMS mount. What gauger did was bend the truth by saying any hardware touching the shell robbed resonance, when in reality for those who could see by his demonstration of holding a drum in your hand and hitting it equalled more resonance, that its how the drum is coupled to the floor, not what's bolted to the shell.

You could mount a faucet to those drums in the video, being 'de coupled' from the floor they would still 'ring' out w/full resonance.

Still up for grabs is bass drum spurs designed with active suspension (yup, think motor car). PEARL already came out with the FTom rubber feet sporting cut-outs years ago, they work well for the FT, others have followed with similar rubber feet, still no active, vibration canceling bass drum spurs tho.


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There's still another way to get resonance without buying anything - learn how to tune the drum while it's in place ;) That's how it used to be done in the dark ages.
 
There's still another way to get resonance without buying anything - learn how to tune the drum while it's in place ;) That's how it used to be done in the dark ages.


You're still limited by coupling (to the floor), Gauger demonstrated that 30 years ago, started a revolution that resonated throughout the industry. When you de couple from the floor bottom end is increased and the full spectrum gains dynamic headroom.

Most drummers don't want full resonance anyway, hence the huge market for dampening devises, MOONGEL, rings, foam bits etc.
 
Goes along with what Bob Gatzen was talking about a a number of years ago using small foam squares to place your floor tom on and the difference it makes in resonance and tone which was huge. I tried this on my own floor toms using some 1/2" or so thick soft rubber squares and can attest to his findings it makes a huge difference.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_C4Jnl9PYKQ Go to about the 4:20 mark to see it.
 
RIMS mounts are for rack toms, no? Unless you put your rack tom in a snare basket, this isn't a RIMS killer. A Dynamount killer, sure, but that was pretty much already dead when isolating feet became popular. This is an aftermarket solution designed to do the same that isolating feet do. Not that it's not a good product, though- it's great!
 
You're still limited by coupling (to the floor), Gauger demonstrated that 30 years ago, started a revolution that resonated throughout the industry. When you de couple from the floor bottom end is increased and the full spectrum gains dynamic headroom.

Most drummers don't want full resonance anyway, hence the huge market for dampening devises, MOONGEL, rings, foam bits etc.

Couldn't someone just come up with a way to eliminate the floor?
 
Good idea for the snare basket crowd.
 
RIMS mounts are for rack toms, no? Unless you put your rack tom in a snare basket, this isn't a RIMS killer. A Dynamount killer, sure, but that was pretty much already dead when isolating feet became popular. This is an aftermarket solution designed to do the same that isolating feet do. Not that it's not a good product, though- it's great!


There's RIMS for rack and FToms, no ones solved the bass drum resonance equation, when they do mounted toms are along for the ride.

A bass drum version could be made, they'd be bigger, mounted toms and the bass drum itself would receive positive FX. If you mount toms on a stand, not bass drum, some sort of BOOTY SHAKER will work.

Its all how the drum couples with the floor, not what's mounted to the shell, Gauger proved it 30 years ago, people didn't see that aspect, they bought what he was selling, did/does the same thing, de couples the drum(s) from the floor.
 
You could do a Booty Shaker for a bass drum.

One each in the foot. You could extend the spike to fit in a small slot in a plastic base with the foam supporting the actual foot. Solve the moving/sliding problem by having the plastic base with velcro on it for a rug.
If someone was interested, or concerned about having a bass drum that much more resonant, they would deal with a small rug, or attaching something to an existing rug.

One piece of the foam for under the batter side area in front of the hoop.
That could be achieved in a few ways, either attached to a plate and rig something with a hoop cut out (like lifter bass drum hoops DW makes), and a 1" lift instead of a taller one like they have out now (those are maybe 2" tall or whatever).
It could just be a small piece of foam that lifts the batter end up a little and you just put that much of a lift (of whatever material) under the pedal plate.

Most people aren't going for max resonance in a bass drum anyway, so it'd probably never sell--or sell very little.

You'd probably get as much resonance by lifting the front of the drum up a little, instead of having the drum flat (or almost flat) on the floor. I've always ad the front up a little, The sound of the drum is much better to me, and so is the pedal action.

Some people seem afraid to do that, because of some perceived fear of harming the drum by having it up more on one end. Some may even think it's wrong to do it--why I have no idea.
A bass drum is never going to go out of round doing this, nor is a bass drum hoop. A hoop isn't going to get broken unless it is abused. It's not going to happen.

YES, the 'Lil Booty Shakers for snare baskets work great. Really fantastic.
 
You could do a Booty Shaker for a bass drum.

One each in the foot. You could extend the spike to fit in a small slot in a plastic base with the foam supporting the actual foot. Solve the moving/sliding problem by having the plastic base with velcro on it for a rug.


If someone was interested, or concerned about having a bass drum that much more resonant, they would deal with a small rug, or attaching something to an existing rug.



Most people aren't going for max resonance in a bass drum anyway, so it'd probably never sell--or sell very little.


If your toms are mounted to the bass drum and you de coupled the bass drum from the floor the toms are then also de coupled, that's what I meant by they're along for the ride. So yeah de coupling the bass drum makes a lot of sense, especially if you mount toms on it.

A integrated set of spurs that could do the job would be revolutionary.
 
You'd probably get as much resonance by lifting the front of the drum up a little, instead of having the drum flat (or almost flat) on the floor. I've always ad the front up a little, The sound of the drum is much better to me, and so is the pedal action.

Absolutely, I don't see why it wouldn't work.

Additionally, bass drums with a pedal on one side SHOULD have the front hoop off the floor to be completely level, since there's the lift of whatever part of the pedal is below the batter hoop on the batter side in play.

I really wish I had some reason to get Booty Shakers but unfortunately my Pearl S2000 snare stand does pretty much the same thing, and my floor tom legs already have Pearl suspension feet. But they're still a great, inexpensive fix for this classic issue.
 
The Pearl suspension feet are what I have too. They do the job well, and my FT's are very resonant.
I have the Pearl stand you have too, and believe it or not, the 'Lil Booty Shakers make a difference on that stand also.

What ever stand the tom is on, it's like you are holding the drum by the rim with your fingers.
If you want your tom to really sing, get the 'Lil Booty Shakers. I love those things.

Dixon makes a lift that works for bass drums up to 24".
If I remember correctly, it said the pad/lift part is filled with something to level any size out. If that part had the Booty Shaker foam on top of it, you would get more tone out of the drum. If the bass drum legs had the B.S. feet things on them (and were able to stay in one place), you'd have all the frequencies of tone you could dial in.

Not sure how much more in the lower tones you'd want out of a 24, but for an 18 or 20", it would be pretty cool.
Just some Booty foam on the lift would make a difference I'd think. OR, take the rubber tips off the BD leg, fix the spike so it wouldn't go through, and use Pearl suspension feet on the BD leg tips. That might work too.
 
Its all how the drum couples with the floor, not what's mounted to the shell,.
It's both, & while we're at it, referring to moongel & other dampeners, they suppress head sustain & overtones, not shell resonance. What's attached to the shell directly affects shell resonance, & that's one primary mechanism for shaping the fundamental, & the length of note (the tone you hear through the mix), not head sustain (the bit that gets lost in the mix). All that said, if you prefer a non resonant shell (a totally valid approach), then what you attach to the shell makes little difference.
 
It's both, & while we're at it, referring to moongel & other dampeners .

In Andys new book "Windchimes and Me" He has a chapter dedicated to wind chime booty shakers. Also he discusses resonance and dampening do's and dont's of wind chimes. Its a follow up book to his best seller " Plastic wood blocks and other oxy-morons".
 
I can say with some experience that the Dixson bass drum lift does increase kick drum resonance. It's not any sort of shock absorber, but it raises the kick drum completely off of the ground. No metal parts. Foam padding between the kick and the lift.
 
Thirty years ago drum hardware had become so sturdy that it held the drum in place without any movement which killed the resonance. RIMS did help to improve this by allowing the shell to bounce a little bit but still has a big flaw in that it puts tension on the rods as the shell bounces. If you tune while mounted it does provide better results but still not ideal. Mounting the tom on a snare stand is also tricky because you have to pinch the bottom rim as to not kill the tone. Booty shakers seem like an okay idea for the smaller toms but as the drums get larger they are a bit harder to tame so I prefer a bit less resonance that you get from legs.

If you check out the Ludwig kits on Memphis Drum shops web site, at least half the kits tom mounts are directly on the shell, not even the new Atlas mounts are used. The idea of not adding a couple extra holes in the shell is kind of stupid to me. What you really want is to not hold the shell to firmly in place. I think Yamaha has the right idea and if you really don't want to drill any extra holes I really like the DW and Mapex mounts. The new Tama Star mounts also make sense to me. Notice in the pic that this drum is to far down on the mounting rod.
 

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I've often wondered if hardware on the shell that some of us obsess over is a non-issue when standing 50 or 100 feet in front of a drum kit, in a room full of sound absorbing audience clothing, with speakers and amps altering the sound in a myriad of ways.

In other words does it really make a difference to the people listening or just to the player...
 
It's both, & while we're at it, referring to moongel & other dampeners, they suppress head sustain & overtones, not shell resonance. What's attached to the shell directly affects shell resonance, & that's one primary mechanism for shaping the fundamental, & the length of note (the tone you hear through the mix), not head sustain (the bit that gets lost in the mix). All that said, if you prefer a non resonant shell (a totally valid approach), then what you attach to the shell makes little difference.


When a mounted drum is struck a vibrational wave is sent through it... and everything between that drum and the floor, if that 'everything' isn't de coupled from the floor the wave returns to the drum and back to floor again repeatedly until the wave has dissipated.

This is what we experience with direct mounted drums, one of the fx being less head sustain due to vibrational canceling. Bo Eder questioned eliminating the floor, and the floor in some cases can be more forgiving (floating stage/riser vs concrete slab) acting as an absorber affecting tone, so direct mounted toms can sound different in certain grounding situations.

A drum shell with less hardware attached isn't going to be allowed its full sonic potential unless its de coupled from the floor, just the same as a drum with more hardware attached. So yeah its understandable a drum shell with minimal attachments will have a different tone than the same shell with more hardware attached, but the deciding factor of that tone is more so determined by how the shells are coupled to the floor and we see this demonstrated.

Since most drums do have hardware attached, a small tom mount isn't going to make a great noticeable difference as Gary Gauger implied in his RIMS demonstration 30 years ago.
 

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