I'm looking to replace the snare wires on my 8x14 80s Tama Superstar. As most of you probably know, the wires are longer than the width of the drum (15" to be exact) and hang out past the edges, supported by rollers. I figured a set of 15" Puresound wires would work, but when I went to put them on, I discovered that 15" Puresound wires are actually 14" long.
I never thought about this before, but it makes perfect sense. When the wires are called 15", that means they are for a 15" snare, not that the length is 15". The ends of the wires have to fit inside of the 15" diameter edges of the drum (1/2" inch on each side) so the actual length of the wires is 14".
I did a little research and found some posts that said Pearl Free Floating snare wires should work. Thing is, I'm not familiar with the Free Floater, and don't know if the snares are 15". And I can't find any info on the actual length anywhere. From the pictures of Free Floaters I've seen, it doesn't look like the snares hang out as far as on the Superstare
SO... my question is, what snare wires are available that would fit my Superstar correctly? What wires are exactly 15" long? Does anyone have any experience with this? Any other choices besides Pearl? I was hoping to get a 24 strand set. Thanks!
Am sort of the same boat as you since I also have an 8x14 Tama snare drum (Artstar model in my case) that came with a 1983 Superstar super-mahogany kit I bought in that year--way back then I foolishly took off the original snare wires to try others and they somehow managed to disappear (perhaps happened when my son left home to be on his own and while taken the Tama set in tow with him)!
Anyhow, a few months ago I brought the deep Tama snare back to my home and worked on the throw-off which wasn't working properly. After figuring out what the problem was, giving it a good cleaning plus lubing decided to keep it (my son has enough snare drums in his collection that doesn't need it), and since he already had installed a brand new Aquarian Focus-X batter head I went ahead and purchased an Attack medium weight resonant head and a set of 15" generic set snare wires (the latter were installed with grosgrain ribbon rather than nylon strips).
Now, while 15" wires helped somewhat they aren't long enough to satisfy the original design intent (something akin Tama's King Beat snares, which had the parallel strainer mechanism--oh how I wish I'd have purchase one of them back then!--except without the added cost and complexity of such throw-off system).
But have figured out a way to "fix" the problem, something which came to be after recently purchasing a set of Gibraltar 10/10 split snare wires for a '66 Ludwig KB super-sensitive snare drum, which wound up been not only the wrong set for it (the end metal tabs were too wide to fit the earlier version of the SS mechanism) but too long as well!
Couldn't return them because I had my son cut and reshape the end tabs, which was done before discovering they were of the wrong length as well.
So had to purchase a correct set of Puresound snare wires to address this issue.
Anyway, while recently checking a thread posted in the Vintage Forum at Drum Forum Org. where the poster explained the DIY method he performed in order to replace the snare wires on a vintage Premier snare drum he owns by using a similar set of split wires as the Gibraltars I bought, the light went on in my head: man, I can do the very same thing to replace the longer version of the missing Tama snare wires!
Placing the split Gibraltar on the bottom side of the 8" Tama snare drum and measuring them have figured that if I desolder the wires (20 individual strands with an effective length of 16"!) and resolder them on two standard metal end tabs (will have to be canibalized from another snare wires set) that the correct length can be achieved since 16 inches seems to be what it takes to accomplish the task.
Meantime have also discovered that Gibraltar makes a set of 16" snare wires, which runs around $10 bucks; I ordered a set last night from Sam Ash.
If these doesn't work then I'll perform the DIY modifications necessary to get the Gibraltar split wires set to work, but have the sneaking feeling that they will.
Either way, am determined to get the Artstar beauty (still looks like new!)...an snare drum whose sound is as great as its looks...configured as it was originally designed. You might want to consider doing the same with your Tama drum...
-elcid