Coated Emperor on bass drum...booyah!

I have a fairly "worn in" Ludwig Classic Maple kit I got on eBay a while back. It sounds great but it has a 22x14" kick, which I find a bit tricky to get to sound big enough in a really loud, amplified setting (un-mic'd).

It came with a Coated Emperor batter which I had tossed aside in favor of a clear PS3, without having even tried to tune it up first. I did today...and man it sounds huge! It definitely beats the PS3 on this drum, to my ears. Feels good too!

I know a lot of drummers used them in the past (Bonham?) but are many folks out there doing this now?

I'm having trouble w/ the PS3...most of them that I buy simply don't fit my kick drums...the hoops don't sit flat on the edge of the head and they just don't tune up right. If they do tune up, it doesn't come easily and it's hard to reproduce it. I think I'm through w/ this head.

With an un-ported Coated Ambassador in front and some cut-up foam bedding sitting in the bottom, this kick sounds like a monster!

Is it like a jazzy boom or a big rock boom?

I thought about trying Emperors front and back on my Force 3007s, a 20x17.5 bass drum but I was a little worried about if it would still sound like the punchy boom I get with my PS3 now. Unported reso of course.

zambizzi said:

I'm having trouble w/ the PS3...most of them that I buy simply don't fit my kick drums...the hoops don't sit flat on the edge of the head and they just don't tune up right.

Click to expand...

Hey zambizzi, just a thought.... I just had my 22x18 cut down to a 22x14 a couple weeks ago and the guy that did it put a counter cut on the inside of the hoops.

I didn't ask him to, but we were talking about it for the hoops of a new 24" bass drum he's building me - I had seen hoops on a drum builder website that had counter cuts as an option so I asked him about it. He said it was to help with seating the heads.

We then got into a long conversation about Remo vs. Evans, which was very interesting. Here's the condensed version: The two are mortal enemies. Both use Mylar film, which is only made by DuPont. DuPont owns Remo. The film is made in large sheets where the highest quality Mylar runs down the center of the sheets (it's most consistent with thickness). DuPont sells the lower quality (larger variation in thickness) edge cuts to Evans, which is why Remo is superior to Evans.

I don't know how much of any of that is actually true, but when I got home I put a used PS3 back on my 22" and not only did it seat properly (possibly due to the counter cut on the hoop), but sounded better than the Evans EMAD that had been on there. Hmmm.

Anyway, all this is to say that if you like PS3 and don't have counter cut BD hoops, that might be a solution.

Chaos_Inferno said:

Is it like a jazzy boom or a big rock boom?

I thought about trying Emperors front and back on my Force 3007s, a 20x17.5 bass drum but I was a little worried about if it would still sound like the punchy boom I get with my PS3 now. Unported reso of course.

Click to expand...

The way that I have it tuned, it's definitely ready for rock. It's louder than the PS3 was on there and tuned up much better.

The head was already broken in quite well. I don't imagine that a new Emperor would have sounded quite as nice...they take some time to "play in".

It's definitely *different* than the PS3. I'm able to get a lower pitch...but that may be due to the PS3 not seating correctly in the first place.

MikeM said:

Hey zambizzi, just a thought.... I just had my 22x18 cut down to a 22x14 a couple weeks ago and the guy that did it put a counter cut on the inside of the hoops.

I didn't ask him to, but we were talking about it for the hoops of a new 24" bass drum he's building me - I had seen hoops on a drum builder website that had counter cuts as an option so I asked him about it. He said it was to help with seating the heads.

We then got into a long conversation about Remo vs. Evans, which was very interesting. Here's the condensed version: The two are mortal enemies. Both use Mylar film, which is only made by DuPont. DuPont owns Remo. The film is made in large sheets where the highest quality Mylar runs down the center of the sheets (it's most consistent with thickness). DuPont sells the lower quality (larger variation in thickness) edge cuts to Evans, which is why Remo is superior to Evans.

I don't know how much of any of that is actually true, but when I got home I put a used PS3 back on my 22" and not only did it seat properly (possibly due to the counter cut on the hoop), but sounded better than the Evans EMAD that had been on there. Hmmm.

Anyway, all this is to say that if you like PS3 and don't have counter cut BD hoops, that might be a solution.

Click to expand...

Wow...that's an interesting story. I wonder if it's myth or not?

Remo definitely sounds better to me but Evans quality is superior, IMO. I've been messing around with the clear EQ4 batter head on one of my kicks and it sounds every bit as good as the PS3, to me...and is consistently excellent, in quality.

I tried doing my own relief-cut on a pair of Ludwig hoops last summer. It was quick and easy and I'd definitely do that again if I had to. Another idea I had was to find an epoxy/resin that wouldn't affect the acoustic quality of the head, and fill in the channel a bit higher. The problem with Remo BD heads is the low amount of resin which forces the hoop to need to be spread out wider and go further down onto the head, to reach the metal hoop. Evans fills them in completely and the hoops sit flat, as they should.

I used an Emp and an Amb on my bass for many years.
I would use a felt on the batter or I would do the port and stuff thing.
I still like to put the Remos on my bass from time to time for a classic sound.

I just tried the combo (Clear Emp over Coated Amb) and I must say, I really hate it. Yes, they were brand new (oh how $80 hurts the wallet...) and thus not broken in, but the overall tone wasn't the resonant low end I was looking for. And, no, I did not shove anything inside my drum, but to me, that's counter-productive; if I needed to use muffling, I'd just use a pre-muffled head.

Take my opinion with a grain of salt, I used it on a 22x18 Mapex Saturn bass.

And now, I go back to my PS3 over PS3 combo...

Digging up an old one here - but I love a coated emp batter and on my 60s Ludwig 22. I had a smooth white PS3 on there and it's a little too punchy for that drum. I'd use the PS3 for more amplified stuff where I need to cut through, but that Emp is just beautiful. It brings me closer to the Bonham sound (but 4" smaller) and I have a thin Ludwig logo head on the front, which I tune up to med. tight. No hole, felt strips on both sides, and it's ready to gig.

JD7 said:

Digging up an old one here - but I love a coated emp batter and on my 60s Ludwig 22. I had a smooth white PS3 on there and it's a little too punchy for that drum. I'd use the PS3 for more amplified stuff where I need to cut through, but that Emp is just beautiful. It brings me closer to the Bonham sound (but 4" smaller) and I have a thin Ludwig logo head on the front, which I tune up to med. tight. No hole, felt strips on both sides, and it's ready to gig.

Click to expand...

Any idea how an Emperor would work on a 20" Leedy from the mid 50's? I've been using an Ambassador coated, but I've never really considered using anything else on it. Also have the Ludwig logo head, medium/tight.

The 20/13/16 were the "rock" sizes of the catalog, but I've definitely never had a great "rock" sound, or really any impressive low-end range from these drums, despite trying different muffling systems and tuning possibilities. VERY good jazz and other sound possibilities, which I love. Maybe a different head would help?

MikeM said:

Both use Mylar film, which is only made by DuPont. DuPont owns Remo. The film is made in large sheets where the highest quality Mylar runs down the center of the sheets (it's most consistent with thickness). DuPont sells the lower quality (larger variation in thickness) edge cuts to Evans, which is why Remo is superior to Evans.

Click to expand...

Many plastics were invented and first patented by DuPont. However, this is not to say that DuPont is the only company currently producing those plastics known as Mylar.

The patents in the USA have a 20 year term limit since 1995, and without any extensions. Most of the DuPont patents are older and were a 17 year term with a possible 3 year extension to the term. The whole idea for patents is to reward the inventors by granting those patents for their ideas, and after their term of patent is over, others can duplicate the same patent and that furthers the understanding, use and development of science and technology in many fields.

The patent can be for a chemical compound of the material, a method of manufacturing, or an apparatus that was used in the manufacturing of the compound. Mylar was made in the 50’s and now the same chemical compound that makes the material known as Mylar, and the machines and methods of manufacture, used to make the material known as Mylar can be legally duplicated to manufacture the material. There may be some additional patents that DuPont currently owns that make their Mylar different in some small way, and DuPont may say that their “Mylar” is superior to the others. But, there are also some other companies that have patents that make their version of Mylar different from DuPont’s, who then say that they improved on the original DuPont patent and say their version is superior.

No other company can produce “Mylar.” But, “Mylar” is simply a name and the legal rights to the name are called a trademark. A trademark is an ongoing license to the name or a logo, or a jingle and as long as the name is actively used for about 5 years.

If Evens, Aquarian or “Joes Drum heads” wants to produce a drum head made of the same or similar material known as “Mylar,” and DuPont is giving them inferior product with an uneven thickness or some other flaw, that company can simply go to another source or produce the material themselves.

Let me just say that if a company does not make technological improvements to their products, competition will make those improvements and all that is left of the edge for developing that product is the name.