Drum Factory Direct "home made" snare drum?

I've never built a snare drum from the ground up. There's just too many things to go wrong, especially if you have to drill holes. The closest I came was when I put together a Pearl Sensitone aluminum snare drum with a shell and parts purchased separately. Everything was Pearl Sensitone, so there was no measuring, no drilling, and no cutting. It was just like Mister Potato Head.

The only dicey part I encountered was an ever-so-slight roundness issue with the shell. The gods of drum repair were looking down favorably upon me because I simply gave it a little push and was restored to perfect roundness.

I know the limitations of my tools, training and experience. That's about as far as I'd ever go building any drum.
 
Honestly, doing the layout and drilling yourself isn't all that bad......go slow.

Make sure it everything is square (vertically) for lugs requiring 2 mounting holes. To give yourself a margin of error, choose lugs with one mounting hole. Put a head and a rim on the shell and insert rods and use that as a guide to where the lugs need to fall etc. I used basic common sense to build the snares I have.

The cherry ply is a "go to" wood snare for me......it sounds amazing with a wide tuning range and with the die cast hoops it gives a great woody tone more than my other wood drums.

I encourage folks to try a build.....if you mess it up, all you are out is a shell......get another one and try again.......Cherry 1.jpg
 
River19 said:
Honestly, doing the layout and drilling yourself isn't all that bad......go slow.

Make sure it everything is square (vertically) for lugs requiring 2 mounting holes. To give yourself a margin of error, choose lugs with one mounting hole. Put a head and a rim on the shell and insert rods and use that as a guide to where the lugs need to fall etc. I used basic common sense to build the snares I have.

The cherry ply is a "go to" wood snare for me......it sounds amazing with a wide tuning range and with the die cast hoops it gives a great woody tone more than my other wood drums.

I encourage folks to try a build.....if you mess it up, all you are out is a shell......get another one and try again.......View attachment 143758
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Do you remember how much that snare cost you in parts? Does DFD keep digital records of all your purchases like Sweetwater?
 
Totigerus said:
Do you remember how much that snare cost you in parts? Does DFD keep digital records of all your purchases like Sweetwater?
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So I got some of the parts for that drum from DFD and I can't recall where I got the rest......BUT......I see that my Walnut Stave build order for all the hardware without the shell (drum below)......and that was exactly $299 in 2021. So I believe the Cherry drum above would have been about the same as they both have die cast hoops and 10 lugs, actually the cherry hardware may have been about $20-30 cheaper as the Trick strainer on the walnut drum was like $70 alone. I do know the cherry shell was $90.......with snare beds and bearing edges cut to my specs. So call that cherry drum ~$380-400 to build.

The stave shell was more expensive built to my specs by Daville Drumworks......so that drum was probably ~$450 all in.



the hardware IMG_5961.jpeg
 
I think if you are wanting the experience of building your own drum, then by all means, buy the parts and do it.

If you are just wanting to save money on a black nickel over brass, there are better options which are cheaper and more convenient.

It all depends what your goals are.
 
PorkPieGuy said:
I think if you are wanting the experience of building your own drum, then by all means, buy the parts and do it.

If you are just wanting to save money on a black nickel over brass, there are better options which are cheaper and more convenient.

It all depends what your goals are.
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So true. I should have stated in the OP that I was looking to get a black beauty on the cheap. I'm not even a DIY guy really. This was basically just an experiment to see how much the total would be IF I were to DIY it.🤷‍♂️
 
Totigerus said:
So true. I should have stated in the OP that I was looking to get a black beauty on the cheap. I'm not even a DIY guy really. This was basically just an experiment to see how much the total would be IF I were to DIY it.🤷‍♂️
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I did a similar experiment about 15 years ago to see if I could build/assemble a drumset in much the same way. I learned quite quickly it is significantly cheaper to buy something pre-built assuming I didn't want/need something highly unique or specific.
 
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Don't for a second think building your own will be cheaper than something of quality made in quantity on a production line of some sort with parts sourced in higher quantities and lower cost than an individual can purchase. The only path I found to making it "cheaper" was to do as I mentioned in sourcing a very reasonably priced donor drum for hardware.......but that is a somewhat different goal.

That being said, there are numerous "Drum Brands" that are really just drum assemblers and finishers, particularly snares.......nothing wrong with that but they are basically building the same snares etc like the ones I "built" pictured in this thread and in most cases they are charging a fair amount for their work, and they should as time is money, but if you like a project, many snares by these boutique brands selling for $600-1000 can be built for half that.

But I agree if the goal is a Black Beauty sound for less......just buy any one of the numerous drums that are 90-98% of the BB sound for less $.
 
Winston_Wolf said:
I did a similar experiment about 15 years ago to see if I could build/assemble a drumset in much the same way. I learned quite quickly it is significantly cheaper to buy something pre-built assuming I didn't want/need something highly unique or specific.
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I think the same goes for just about any kind of instrument made of wood.

I was on an acoustic guitar building forum many years ago, and there was a guy on there that said after he bought the wood needed in addition to all of the tooling, his first guitar to build cost him over $17,000 (and this was 20 years ago at least). He said his second guitar was significantly cheaper, but that first one...sheesh.
 
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Totigerus said:
So true. I should have stated in the OP that I was looking to get a black beauty on the cheap. I'm not even a DIY guy really. This was basically just an experiment to see how much the total would be IF I were to DIY it.🤷‍♂️
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Buy the Asian versions already built and ready to play. Even Ludwig makes one.
 
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