Vic Firth 5B Inconsistency? Anyone?

ulubatli

Member
2 months ago I switched to Vic Firth 5Bs and loved them. The weight felt focused towards the bottom end and the sticks felt lighter than Vic Firth 55As to my suprise. I never thought using 5B type sticks for lighter music but these seemed to fit the bill for both rock and music with less bashing.

However today I went ahead and bought a new pair and they are nothing like my first pair. They are definitely heavier and the weight distribution is not towards the bottom end and they feel more like thicker and heavier 5As. I tried all the pairs at the store and they were all the same.

I'm quite surprised and disappointed . I came back home and checked my old pair to see if they were maple (the AH5Bs), but no...

Has anybody who use 5Bs experienced such an inconsistency before? Is it common? I thought Vic Firth had the most consistent sticks. Do you think I can get the feel I'm looking for with the maple ones, 'cause these seem only good for heavy hitting stuff.

I'd really like to hear about similar experiences
 
hey man
you probably got the one pair that wasn't really consistent with the actual batch of sticks

the big companies match their sticks by weight. each drumstick is different from stick to stick. the best drumstick companies can do is take the straight sticks and weight them, then they color match them so the bricks of sticks have consistent weight. some places even pitch tune their sticks, but since we have human ears we cant hear the difference unless a computer is involved, which makes that brand of stick more expensive because they have to pay someone to sit and bang the sticks together. if the pairs weight to the gram there is no need to make your customers pay more. hickory trees usually have two types of wood in the same trunk of tree.... the heart wood which is brown... also light in weight and then theres the outside wood.... its white and way heavier than the heart wood. both parts of the wood make a great stick. you probably got a pair that was boarder line not going to the stores, but one of the two factors either of weight or color is what got that pair to the shelf. we sell both white and dark hickory. it gives the drummer one more option in designing their stick.
 
I had a similar experience; I bought two pairs of 5B's at two different music stores, and one pair was significantly lighter than the other. However, both pairs were matched in terms of weight. I don't think this is at all unusual. Wood is a natural material with varying density from tree to tree, and because of that there will be weight variations from pair to pair, even within the same model designation.
 
Yea I had the same experience many moon ago. I switch back and forth from 5a to 5b sometimes even 2b depending on what I'm playing so I thought maybe thats what it was. But after a while I knew something wasn't feeling right. I don't know if it's a mental thing or what but I switched to nylon tips. Sure they still feel a little different from time to time but I seem to get more evenly matched sticks.
 
@Customdrumstix.BIZ

He man thanks, that answers my question pretty well. I've also noticed the better pair is brownish and the it feel more like wood while the new pair is whiter and feels somehow denser. It's probably about the part of the tree which was used.
I'll try to find the brown pairs from now on, I didn't know about the distinction.

Cheers!
 
This is one reason I switched to Silver Fox. I played Vic Firth 5As for years, and in the last few years, I noticed some real issues with this kind of thing happening. Sometimes one pair of them would literally be twice the weight of another pair. I would break a stick, pull another one out of my stick holster, and it would be so off it would feel like I was playing a 5A and a marching stick...no joke. With the speed that I play at in some cases, it is hard to maintain single stroke rolls, etc, when the weight switches that much. I have never had that problem with Silver Fox.
 
Its wood. Once the finish is broken, sticks take on moisture. Used sticks will always be heavier than new ones, noticeably.

No company can produce a wood stick that weighs the same consistently, its wood, they have no control. 5B, 5A, 7A, these #'s don't have anything to do with weight, they relate to the size of the stick.

One day the heavier 5B may feel better than the lighter ones for the job. Like wood, humans are inconsistent and influenced by tempeture and moisture.
 
I'm aware that used sticks tend to get heavier with all the moisture from your hands. That's why I was surprised to see the newer pair being noticeably heavier than the heavily used pair.

Also I don't understand why the weight distribution would be different. Even though the density changes, due to the size and shape (which is same) center of weight should have been at the same spot to create the same feel (heavy towards the butt end and light towards the tip)
 
I played Vic Firth 5B for years but about a year ago switched to Vater for the same reason you mentioned. No problems with Vater at all.
 
All wooden sticks of the same model have some variations in weight. Some companies maybe make them more consistent than the others, but they can never all be the same.
That's why you should always go through a few pairs when buying and select those that feel the closest to your ideal.
 
Hey DW,

I came across this video of how Vic Firth makes its sticks. I find it interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pL5EhqblxI

Personally, I've usded both VF and Vater and find that both brands will have minor differences from one pair to another - even from stick to stick, at times. It's very difficult have complete uniformity with natural materials, but they both do a really good job.

Best,
rjvsmb
 
Its wood. Once the finish is broken, sticks take on moisture. Used sticks will always be heavier than new ones, noticeably.

No company can produce a wood stick that weighs the same consistently, its wood, they have no control. 5B, 5A, 7A, these #'s don't have anything to do with weight, they relate to the size of the stick.

One day the heavier 5B may feel better than the lighter ones for the job. Like wood, humans are inconsistent and influenced by tempeture and moisture.

completely true.... stick co's take each stick of every batch and weigh them before pairing them. there could be 2000 5b's rolling off the belt one day(no joke vic firth does something like 90000 a day.....90000 I didn't mis type it) and they have a bin for each increment of weight.... which means not all 2000 of those sticks are going to go weigh the same....why? if your wondering all tree have 2 types of wood in the tree... the heart wood and the outer wood ( I can't remember its name) but they both have different densities...dont be upset that they can make great looking looking sticks but the weight is off sometimes, but be up upset that the weight of that batch is not printed on the brick.... I mean come on....if they did that you shop for sticks even more freely.....GC doesn't have your 5bs in the weight you want so they call GC in monroeville and it turns out they have that weight...so u go get them....or just take a kitchen scale with u wen u go stick shopping.... the big co's ha their funny like that

cdx
 
hey, could someone help me out here?.......i have seen a pair of vic firth 8D's i want to buy, but they are on the internet so i cannot see them up close, i thought that all vic firth sticks looked the same, but this stick is different...have a look......if you know of this type, reply back as soon as possible, i really need to know if there is any difference between them and the original look, thanks

http://www.projectdrums.net/ekmps/sh...an-classic.jpg
 
hey, could someone help me out here?.......i have seen a pair of vic firth 8D's i want to buy, but they are on the internet so i cannot see them up close, i thought that all vic firth sticks looked the same, but this stick is different...have a look......if you know of this type, reply back as soon as possible, i really need to know if there is any difference between them and the original look, thanks

http://www.projectdrums.net/ekmps/sh...an-classic.jpg

Link doesn't work.
2020202020202020202020
 
I can't quite vouch for the 5B's, but I had a set of X5B's (extreme 5b's...a little longer than standards) where 3 of them were good, the other 2 sets busted within a few hours of practice time.

Sounds inconsistent to me.
 
Back
Top