Holy Moly... POPLAR???

stage star-mahogany

swingstar-mahogany

imperialstar -poplar -todays model at least


the 80s might be mahogany
 
intheruff said:
Elvis, I appreciate that web site to get the pr wrap. I'll need some for the base d hoops. Some other divits I'll leave to retain what it is they are. Like Harry said, they're a 'players' kit, and that they'll remain. But, the restore will have em' looking great. I've only seen one other kit with that finish. I almost remember the days from which their look capture... lol.
Big Beat or Hollywood? Not sure I follow. However, let me guess and say Hollywood NOT! And, I believe Big beat was before I played, I think... haha. It was Mitch Mitchell and the like that got me playing.
I curious about your big fluffy beater. No thud there.
"Big Beat" and "Hollywood" were names Ludwig gave to their 22-12-13-16 kits.
One pre-dates the other (I believe Hollywood came first, but don't quote me), but its the same configuation (might still be called "Big Beat" today).
Just wondering.
You're welcome on the website linky.
A few others, which might help you with hardware items would be...
Drum Supply House
Precisioin Drum Company
American Music Drum Parts
All-Star Drum Works

Check those out and see what you find..



Elvis
 
Elvis and Harry... I've saved the websites you mentioned. Thanks for all your insights, information, and providing me with these sites. I'll post ya' when I begin the project. Elvis, I go to Seattle once in a while and if possible I'll give you a heads up the next time I'm over. Best to all, Al
 
Wood is overrated. It's maybe 20% of a drum's sound. They were replaced by Visions, which come in three types: all birch, all maple, and birch-poplar-birch.
You mean Birch/basswood/birch.
Wood is overrated? Tell that to my Renoun African Mahogany Purewood kit!
 
You mean Birch/basswood/birch.
Wood is overrated? Tell that to my Renoun African Mahogany Purewood kit!

I keep telling people that I have never had a problem distinguishing between cheap soft wood drums and quality wood, especially bubinga and African mahogany vs all poplar or basswood drums. The same thickness shells sound quite different between woods.

I am sure there are exceptions and ways around that.

A poplar export kit might go "boom" but an African Mahogany kit goes *BOOM*
 
I keep telling people that I have never had a problem distinguishing between cheap soft wood drums and quality wood, especially bubinga and African mahogany vs all poplar or basswood drums. The same thickness shells sound quite different between woods.

I am sure there are exceptions and ways around that.
A poplar export kit might go "boom" but an African Mahogany kit goes *BOOM*


I don't either..there IS a difference! Wood density plays a sizeable role in a drum's sound as does the bearing edge and head (batter and reso) maybe it is 20%!? Case in point: All I know is that between the Gretsch Catalina club mod I have spent a bit of time playing around with (Mahogany..prolly Luan) and The new Purewood AFRICAN mahogany The difference is astounding! With all due respect to dtd, We are talking high end drums with the purewoods and..well not so high end with the Clubs..so in this case wood makes a HUGE difference! The African mahogany set will shake the walls. Absolutely amazing sounding drums!
 
The debate continues. At the 'All Experts' website, http://en.allexperts.com/q/Drums-Percussion-648/2008/10/Drum-wood.htm, one claims the difference between woods can't be heard. I for one think sound projection might have more to do with thickness, dimension and heads rather than wood fiber, even though I started the tread bitching about my fake poplar/balsa, fake mahogany Tamas, not their sound or ruggedness though. The wood I'm sure must matter some, but to who's ear? I'd imagine the greatest difference would be heard by a recording tech and his digital gear compared to a half deaf drummer or head basher (not that I'm refering to anyone here). Hey, any techs out there who'd like to put in their two cents (ok, three cents... more than mine anyway... hehe). To counter my own opinion, I played some Ayottes and they did boom bigger than Hoffmanns Music roomful of differing drums. I unfortunatly didn't note the heads on the Ayottes.
 
I don't either..there IS a difference! Wood density plays a sizeable role in a drum's sound as does the bearing edge and head (batter and reso) maybe it is 20%!? Case in point: All I know is that between the Gretsch Catalina club mod I have spent a bit of time playing around with (Mahogany..prolly Luan) and The new Purewood AFRICAN mahogany The difference is astounding! With all due respect to dtd, We are talking high end drums with the purewoods and..well not so high end with the Clubs..so in this case wood makes a HUGE difference! The African mahogany set will shake the walls. Absolutely amazing sounding drums!

The other aspect that gets glazed over with bearing edges/thickness/so on...

If the axiom is supposed to be true that the drumhead is over 80% of the sound, then all these changes to the shell (which *IS* listening to the WOOD not the drumhead) should not have such a pronounced effect.

That is another reason all the shell variance arguments reinforce the point the WOOD makes the difference.
 
I've always felt that whatever medium the shell is made from sets the basic overall "sound characteristic" that will eminate from the drum, regardless of the other factors involved with its sound.
Its like they used to say about recording Maple shelled drums - "No matter what you do, Maple will always sound like Maple".
If that's not enough for you, compare like sized drums, set up as alike as possible, but made from widely different mediums, such as wood vs. metal.
Even a "warm" sounding metal, like Bronze, is going to give a drum a different basic overall sound characteristic compared to the same thing made from even a "cold" sounding wood, such as Luan.
The problem I think we run into is not recognizing the fact that some mediums will imitate others, and thus its harder to "catagorize" every different type into it own neat little "pigeon hole".
Its been said that Basswood and Poplar tend to accentuate similar frequency's as Maple does.....maybe this is why we saw (still see?) a plethora of shells made for "cost effective" drumkits composed out of a combination of those any 2 of those 3 wood types.

...and the Gretsch Catalina Club kits are 100% Luan. So if you see them listed as being made from Mahogany, its more "Mahogany", than Mahogany.



Elvis
 
I've always felt that whatever medium the shell is made from sets the basic overall "sound characteristic" that will eminate from the drum, regardless of the other factors involved with its sound.
Its like they used to say about recording Maple shelled drums - "No matter what you do, Maple will always sound like Maple".
If that's not enough for you, compare like sized drums, set up as alike as possible, but made from widely different mediums, such as wood vs. metal.
Even a "warm" sounding metal, like Bronze, is going to give a drum a different basic overall sound characteristic compared to the same thing made from even a "cold" sounding wood, such as Luan.
The problem I think we run into is not recognizing the fact that some mediums will imitate others, and thus its harder to "catagorize" every different type into it own neat little "pigeon hole".
Its been said that Basswood and Poplar tend to accentuate similar frequency's as Maple does.....maybe this is why we saw (still see?) a plethora of shells made for "cost effective" drumkits composed out of a combination of those any 2 of those 3 wood types.

...and the Gretsch Catalina Club kits are 100% Luan. So if you see them listed as being made from Mahogany, its more "Mahogany", than Mahogany.



Elvis

From listening this weekend, it was pretty obvious to me that heavy shelled drums (like sonor's sig's) are much more dependent on the drumhead for sound character than a dw collectors or a 76 slingerland for example.

The slingerland was mixed woods, either 3 or 5 ply, but not very thick. On that kit, a coated amb had a similar effect as a 2-ply on a stadium shell like gms (7-8mm)
 
Good point and a common one, to boot.
A lot of people say that thick shells tend to promote the part of the sound that is a factor of the heads, more than thin shelled drums.
This is probably due to there being so much more mass with the thick shelled drum.
...however, that shell is still having an affect on the sound of the drum, due to the medium its made from.
Think if it were a steel shelled drum, of that thickness.
It would be like playing a heavy steel pipe. Do you think that drum would have the same characteristics as the thick wood shelled drum you heard last weekend?


Elvis
 
Think if it were a steel shelled drum, of that thickness.
It would be like playing a heavy steel pipe. Do you think that drum would have the same characteristics as the thick wood shelled drum you heard last weekend?

Elvis

Metal is 100 times as dense as wood. It would transmit sound more effectively. Steel would be dry and loud, based on the Pearl reference steel snare. However, there wasn't a lot of body.
 
...and that's my point and the point of this part of the thread.
WHAT the shell is made of does have an effect on the sound.

Very good, you get a gold star for the day. =)
 

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...and that's my point and the point of this part of the thread.
WHAT the shell is made of does have an effect on the sound.

Very good, you get a gold star for the day. =)

I answered that way on purpose. There is another thread that says basically, wood doesn't matter.

My point was that I can easily hear the difference between a yamaha oak and a pearl export or a PDP basswood and SC bubinga. The counterpoint was that certain other were convinced that it wasn't the wood, it was other factors.
 
To both your point. I just performed a completely unscientific experiment, but it was interesting anyway. I took similarly worn Evan Hydraulics and mounted them on 13' Tama and Ludwig shells. Both drums were identical other than the wood... eight inch depth and same rim and lugs. I spent nearly an hour doing the best i could to get them tuned 'identical'. One issue that hasn't been mentioned was whether the opinions you expressed were based on whether the shells had a resonant head or not, presuse they did. My test was on concert toms, so they didn't have a resonate head and I'd guess the type of batter used would have the most profound effect on the drums sound. However, after getting all the buzzes and rattles taken care of, and spending about a half hour hitting the drums and listening from arms length and from both sides of the head, I determined (drums roll please) Psffffst!... that both drums have a similar attack that I couldn't really tell the difference between the two, however again, the Tama's had a sustain that outlasted the Ludwigs by a noticable length of time, albeit quite miniscule in reality. So, as far as I'm concerned, based on this elementary experiment and my experience on those Ayottes mentioned earlier, count me in the school that believes wood at least makes some difference... and why shouldn't it? I'd still like to hear from a recording tech on this matter. I wonder what kind of drums have that African wood someone mentioned earlier?
 
To both your point. I just performed a completely unscientific experiment, but it was interesting anyway. I took similarly worn Evan Hydraulics and mounted them on 13' Tama and Ludwig shells. Both drums were identical other than the wood... eight inch depth and same rim and lugs. I spent nearly an hour doing the best i could to get them tuned 'identical'. One issue that hasn't been mentioned was whether the opinions you expressed were based on whether the shells had a resonant head or not, presuse they did. My test was on concert toms, so they didn't have a resonate head and I'd guess the type of batter used would have the most profound effect on the drums sound. However, after getting all the buzzes and rattles taken care of, and spending about a half hour hitting the drums and listening from arms length and from both sides of the head, I determined (drums roll please) Psffffst!... that both drums have a similar attack that I couldn't really tell the difference between the two, however again, the Tama's had a sustain that outlasted the Ludwigs by a noticable length of time, albeit quite miniscule in reality. So, as far as I'm concerned, based on this elementary experiment and my experience on those Ayottes mentioned earlier, count me in the school that believes wood at least makes some difference... and why shouldn't it? I'd still like to hear from a recording tech on this matter. I wonder what kind of drums have that African wood someone mentioned earlier?

Pearl and Gretsch have made drums using real African mahogany. Pearl reference uses some of it with mixed woods on the reference series.

Just as the pearl chart indicates, low frequencies are much stronger in African mahogany than in maple.
 
I wonder what kind of drums have that African wood someone mentioned earlier?
If your Ludwig's were about 2 or 3 years older, I'd say you have some Mahogany drums yourself, but your shells use the Maple/Poplar/Maple layup.
Any of the older classic American makers typically used a Mahogany interior ply.
Ludwig, Slingerland, Leedy, Gretsch, Rogers, they all used it at one point in time. Generally up to about the early-mid 1960's.
Back then, I understand the particular strain was collectively known as "Honduras Mahogany", however I believe those are so pricey, because they live in the S.A rain forests, that most companies today use another strain collectively known as "Black African Mahogany".
Basically the same thing, but from a different point of origin (naturally). I think it can be had at a cheaper price, thus the propensity to use it.



Elvis
 
I answered that way on purpose. There is another thread that says basically, wood doesn't matter.

My point was that I can easily hear the difference between a yamaha oak and a pearl export or a PDP basswood and SC bubinga. The counterpoint was that certain other were convinced that it wasn't the wood, it was other factors.
So we're in agreement. Good.

...and if you'd like to take what I've written here, over to that other thread, and say, "LOOK YOU BUNCH OF @$#%^!, SOMEONE ELSE AGREES WITH ME TOO!", I won't have a problem with it.
=)


Elvis
 
I recently used my midnight blue Tama Imperialstar kit for a gig, and for the first time. I was a little worried how it would sound under the mics and strong sound system. These things are powerful but quality built for the time and I'd use them over my Starclassics or Granstars any day. I mean...they're Tama people haha they rule.
 
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