What happened to you is that there were no more natural finish kits left so you got the bottom of the barrel.
They wrapped up what they had and they sent it out.
They shouldn't have done that.
That is indeed exactly what they did to me! I called the store I had the kit shipped from this morning and the drum dept. mgr. swears that Sonor was letting these kits be shipped from the KHS factory with little or no padding between shells and potential projectiles inside the box. I didn't buy it for a second. I asked the dude what the packing peanuts were all about and he tells me that story. So where was the hardware for the kick drum??
He says they opened the box in the warehouse just to make sure everything was intact before they shipped it and forgot to put the little box with the kick claws, rods, spurs and riser back in. I pretty much demanded my money back. I was being cool about this because as we know, the squeaky wheel ain't always gonna get greased. Then dude tells me that I will be responsible for return shipping!!!??? I told him that it was their shoddy pack job and his misrepresentation of what I was getting that caused the damage and my now growing anger. I kept it cool, still..as is my nature. Not the case with the wife who had overheard the conversation (ain't wives amazing that way?) She blew a gasket! Kept trying to get me to 'let her talk to this @*%$!'
The end result, after I calmed her down was they sent a return shipping label, and are shipping me a new kit, unopened (Black Galaxy) and refunding $40 to my plastic.
Final cost $300 and a little aggravation.
I am chalking this up to an isolated incident and hoping for the best. I just cant believe that this is common on an instrument that Sonor would put their name on.
Ha ! That's what you get Pearly !!!! Just kidding. Look.. call KHS/Mapex and ask WHAT IN THE WORLD IS GOING ON ??
Also.. you should go ahead and get the updated Smart Force with the 18" kick.. These feature the NEW UPDATED 100% Poplar shells.
Yeah..hahahaha.. I looked at the smart force kit, but I think this shell pack fits into what I am looking for a tad better as I have hardware and really like the 16" kick and price.
Yikes,sorry to hear that Pearly - that's not good and certainly not a common experience with these kits (guys?). I had a rubber foot missing and a missing wing nut on the kit I had ordered but that was because it was a demo kit and/or wasn't packed up properly - my local dealer gave me the missing parts.
That's what I was thinking regarding this incident being isolated.
Hopefully everything will be alright in a few days!