New Yamaha Drum Lineup?

RobertM

Platinum Member
I was just visiting the Yamaha drum website for USA, and I noticed that they are listing "Absolute Maple" and "Maple Custom Absolute," "Absolute Birch" and "Birch Custom Absolute," and lastly "Beech Custom Absolute."

So, a few questions:

1. Has Yamaha brought back the beech shell?

2. Is the only difference between the "Absolute Maple or Birch" and the "Maple or Birch Custom Absolute" the type of YESS mount used? According to the website images, it looks like the "Absolute" kits sport the YESS II mounts that cover the full shell and attach at 3 or 4 nodal points, while the "____ Custom Absolute" kits are going back to the original recipe of the two-point nodal mounted YESS (like what you still find on the RCs).

The other interesting note: the beech shells use different thickness construction: the 8 and 10 toms are 6-ply/6 mm, the 12 and up shells are 6-ply/7.5 mm, and the bass drums are 8-ply/10 mm.
 
The custom Absolute series (Maple, Birch, Beech) are all discontinued, replaced with the absolute maple, birch…it may be that you can still order the older series absolutes (probably limited to stock on hand, I would guess)..the beech absolutes had the different shell thicknesses…when they were just beech customs they did not offer this...
 
Robert M..

that is older info they have still left up for some reason.. (I've noticed it for years), there are other Yamaha drum websites if you check it out..
 
You'd think the Yamaha USA site would be much better than it is, given that Yamaha is such a large company.
Hard to find specifics sometimes, incomplete listings, outdated listings, and so on.

That said, when it comes to customer service, the few times I've had to contact them, I've been pretty impressed. Questions answered and specific problems solved.
It'd be nice if their website showed the same competency.
 
You'd think the Yamaha USA site would be much better than it is, given that Yamaha is such a large company.
Hard to find specifics sometimes, incomplete listings, outdated listings, and so on.

That said, when it comes to customer service, the few times I've had to contact them, I've been pretty impressed. Questions answered and specific problems solved.
It'd be nice if their website showed the same competency.

Yea they could use a facelift on their website…but I'm with you on their customer service..topnotch in my book (as well)..anytime I've ever needed something, there's never been any problems getting it..they've always been more than willing to help….
 
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I've been disappointed in Yamaha for their lackluster support for the Recording Custom series of drums for years. To this day, they are some of the finest drums ever made, yet virtually no one carries them in stock and even the smaller mom and pop exclusive drum shops will special order only. Why?

I don't think they need a huge range of finishes. They just need to do a better job getting the word out to today's generation of younger drummers.
 
It'd be nice too if they had an internet forum for customers, like a lot of the other manufacturers do.
 
I don't think the Yamaha USA site has been updated in quite a while. The Yamaha Europe site is pretty current. I think it's down to manpower and getting someone to have the time to be a webmaster. The Sabian Forum is also having some issues after their last Webmaster left.

I know Yamaha will never reintroduce the Beech Customs (I have asked, begged and cajoled) and there does seem to be another re-branding (re-naming) going on.

I just hope they don't stop Oak Customs in Honey Amber until I complete my collection.
 
The US website could easily be the worst in the industry. And the dealer presense is pretty anemic as well. I almost wonder why they even bother trying.
 
Dudes.. they changed to the GLOBAL site quite a while back..

You can access it and ALOT of brochures RIGHT HERE

No they didn't. Their own navigation leads me to the US site. The fact that they do a poor job maintaining the US site doesn't make the Global THE site to use. Nor is there even a way for a casual browser to even know that there is a global site.

Simply put, when you go to yamaha.com, the first thing it has you do is click on your country! Not click on the global drums site. And once you click on United States you end up at their shit-tastic US site.

Sorry, their web sites suck. The fact that this is even a discussion, and that you have to know the super secret Global Web Site Change in order to get useful information only reinforces that.
 
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