Anyone still using hanging floor toms?

I had a couple of kits that had hanging floor toms back in the 90’s/early 2000’s. They sounded fine. No issues with that at all. But, at the time, I was using a Gibraltar rack to mount everything to. Love ‘um or hate ‘um, racks solve a lot of problems and they offer a consistent set up every time.

The problem was when I decided to stop using the rack, mounting rack toms on cymbals stands became very troublesome. It was never a question of stability; it was a question of comfort. I could never put the floor tom and the cymbal on whatever stand I attached the tom to in comfortable positions for both.

So I’ve been using floor toms with legs since I stopped using the rack. I honestly like having the ability to independently move things if necessary. I’ve long since sold off my kits with hanging floor toms. In fact, I see used market FLOODED with kits that are having a harder time selling because of the hanging floor tom. (or toms.)

I still have the rack. In fact, my wife still wishes I used the rack. She could and did set up my drums without me several times back in the day. (Roadie and a groupie dare I say!) But I’ve been a stand (flat based) guy for like 15 years now. She’s indifferent to them.
 
I found a good quality mystery kit at a great price (They look like original Keller shells from the early 90's with the DW type lugs on them, but they are not DW's. They are thin 5 ply maple shells, though). That kit came with two hanging floor toms, a 14" (10" deep) and a 16" (14" Deep). If the 14" was 12" or deeper, I would put them both on legs, but a 10" deep drum is just a little too shallow to put on legs. It was odd depth choice, especially since the rack toms are 10" and 12" and both 8" deep. You would think the 14" would have been 12" deep, especially with the 16" being 14" deep. Strange.

So anyway, I left them as hanging floor toms. I bought a mullet wig and pretend I'm late 80's Dave Weckl when I play them lol.
 
To each their own, if you have a rack set up and/or don't have to set it up tear down by yourself all the time it's cool. For me they're a pain in the arse.

I do miss my Arbiter Maple AT kit which had a 14" hanging floor. 1 lug tuning was great!
At the risk of hijacking the thread, a couple of side notes- my gig kit is set up on a rack, so I set it up & break it down every show. It's not a huge kit- 5 piece with an aux snare, and about 7 cymbals including the hats and ride. The rack doesn't save weight, but it saves in setup/breakdown time because everything is memory locked to death, therefore, unlike stands, I don't have to micromanage 4 or 5 stands after setting them up (that one a little closer, this one's gotta rotate a bit, the other has to go to the left an inch, etc; my rehearsal kit, which has all the same pieces of my gig kit duplicated, is on stands because space and micromanaging aren't issues). I put the rack together by fastening 4 clamps that are memory locked (I never remove the "feet" from the vertical posts). The drum/cymbal holder clamps stay on the horizontal pipes, and they're memory locked. So, all I have to do after assembling the rack is slap the holders in; no vertical, horizontal, or rotational adjusting necessary due to the memory locks. The whole thing takes under 10 minutes at a casual pace; micing and running mic cables to the mixer takes longer. It also saves footprint space so it's easier for my bandmates and I to get around stage and place amps in handy places.

Arbiter- I wasn't as excited about anything else when I saw them reviewed in Modern Drummer in... um, the late 90s or early 00s. I hoped that system would catch fire and all the major companies would scramble to get a similar system without infringing copyrights. Alas, it didn't happen. I'd love to know about yours (in a different thread, maybe- I'm gonna search Drummerworld for Arbiter threads as soon as I'm finished with this post). Some company, about a decade ago (?) came out with a retrofitted cable system that tuned drums in the same manner. Can't recall the company or product name.
 
I’ve played church kits with 4 or 6 hanging toms and it was a bit of a job to frequently reconfigure for a different drummers. My personal has two floor toms and there are times I wish everything was rack-mountable.
I concur- in a shared kit situation, floor toms are probably best. On my personal kits, the hanging tom is a faster setup; the clamp it hangs on stays attached to the ride cymbal holder, so once that's up, hanging the tom is faster than attaching 3 legs to a tom.
 
At the risk of hijacking the thread, a couple of side notes- my gig kit is set up on a rack, so I set it up & break it down every show. It's not a huge kit- 5 piece with an aux snare, and about 7 cymbals including the hats and ride. The rack doesn't save weight, but it saves in setup/breakdown time because everything is memory locked to death, therefore, unlike stands, I don't have to micromanage 4 or 5 stands after setting them up (that one a little closer, this one's gotta rotate a bit, the other has to go to the left an inch, etc; my rehearsal kit, which has all the same pieces of my gig kit duplicated, is on stands because space and micromanaging aren't issues). I put the rack together by fastening 4 clamps that are memory locked (I never remove the "feet" from the vertical posts). The drum/cymbal holder clamps stay on the horizontal pipes, and they're memory locked. So, all I have to do after assembling the rack is slap the holders in; no vertical, horizontal, or rotational adjusting necessary due to the memory locks. The whole thing takes under 10 minutes at a casual pace; micing and running mic cables to the mixer takes longer. It also saves footprint space so it's easier for my bandmates and I to get around stage and place amps in handy places.

Arbiter- I wasn't as excited about anything else when I saw them reviewed in Modern Drummer in... um, the late 90s or early 00s. I hoped that system would catch fire and all the major companies would scramble to get a similar system without infringing copyrights. Alas, it didn't happen. I'd love to know about yours (in a different thread, maybe- I'm gonna search Drummerworld for Arbiter threads as soon as I'm finished with this post). Some company, about a decade ago (?) came out with a retrofitted cable system that tuned drums in the same manner. Can't recall the company or product name.

That's why having a rack works for hanging toms, you can get perfect every time with memory locks, I'm a throw a 4 piece up as quick as possible and travel as light as possible guy. Had a rack phase in my uni days with a chrome finish kit, man I thought I was cooler than a polar bears backside! Totally OTT for a 4 piece!

Whenever I've mentioned my old Arbiter here it raises curiosity, it was the first "professional" kit I owned, got it brand new for a steal £450 in 2003. Sounded amazing but ironically to this thread went on the mounted floor tom bracket. The toms were a joy to reskin, took all of 2 minutes. The bass drum was a bit of a pig to change the head.

They were made over here (UK) and you do see them pop up occasionally for dirt cheap. I'm tempted to get another one as they're really well made drums barring the Gibraltar tom bracket! I think manufacturing costs were their downfall plus I read somewhere you could only use remo heads because of the tuning system.
 
I use to have a 14 in mounted tom-which I guess you could call it a floor tom if I didn't have it up on my bass drum tom mounts beside my 12 in tom. I had a 10 in tom hanging off a cymbal mount-so I guess if you were a Leprechaun it could be a floor tom too. Just hang down there real close to the floor-the 12in may need to be a hanging floor tom too. I think the 14 and 16 in are out of the question. I've never seen a 16 in hanging tom? Maybe it or a 15 could be another mounted tom and use a 16 and/or 18 in as floor tom(s). Maybe convert an old 20 bass drum to a floor tom. I'd hate to hang that instrument. Definitely need at least a 26 in kick. Oh forgot our poor Leprechaun friend-I don't think he'd be able to play that monster kit.
 
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What do people think are the negatives for a hanging tom? I don't get it.
 
What do people think are the negatives for a hanging tom? I don't get it.
Hanging floor toms are annoying because they don't always stay put. 14" and 16" floor toms are just too big and heavy for most tom mounting systems and they end up sagging or moving around while playing.

Plus, they require 1) a tom bracket and 2) a hardware stand or rack to hang it from.

A floor tom with legs can support itself without any extra fuss, and no extra hardware.
 
What do people think are the negatives for a hanging tom? I don't get it.
I think most people's gripe is just, to adjust the position of either the drum or the cymbal on the same stand, there's a bit of fidgeting to be done beyond just lifting and repositioning a tripod or FT legs' position on the floor. But, everyone's entitled to feel that the situation grinds their gears for whatever reason. Others who used FT's with legs prior to trying a hanging one may have just not liked that it moves at all- they weren't used to it. Those who always mounted a single rack tom in a snare stand and then flew one off a cymbal stand might find that equally annoying.

My one rare issue is making sure that the tom & cymbal (in my case, the ride- rack toms and one crash are on a double tom stand with a boom cymbal holder clamped on) are a good working distance apart. It just so happens that it works for me with a 14" hanging FT and a 20" ride on the same straight stand, if the drum is mounted with a one-piece clamp and ball & socket arm (of the Mapex/DW/Ludwig type). In the case where I had to use a separate clamp and Tama tom holder, I had to futz with them a bit to achieve the right (for me) distance. I could've just used a boom stand, but with a tom already hanging from the stand (low, in a FT position), I didn't want to also extend a cymbal out past the stand's center of gravity. To get the tom to not extend too far away from the stand, I had to make the clamp and holder not stick out straight over that leg, but make them kinda zigzag. (I'm not sure I'm conveying that well; it makes sense to me because I'm the one that did it. :))

I should also state that, in my case, rarely do my rehearsal kit on stands or gig kit on a rack have to be adjusted; rehearsal kit stays set up all the time, gig kit is memory locked within an inch of its life. I imagine anyone who would need to adjust regularly would likely find hanging toms more annoying.

Hanging floor toms are annoying because they don't always stay put. 14" and 16" floor toms are just too big and heavy for most tom mounting systems and they end up sagging or moving around while playing.

Plus, they require 1) a tom bracket and 2) a hardware stand or rack to hang it from.

A floor tom with legs can support itself without any extra fuss, and no extra hardware.
Mine, hanging from both a rack or stand depending on the kit, stay put. They wobble just a little- as much as my rack toms do but no more (maybe a little less, because the heavier weight is more resistant to the same drumstick strike velocities), but then, they're not "square" depths, but a few inches more shallow- 11x14. (I don't think I would hang 14x14 or 16x16 drums, unless they were thin with light hardware, and maybe still not.) I have noticed that all 3 of my toms wobble more when the stage is somewhat flexible and bandmates are in "performance" mode, shifting their weight around near me- but then, so do all my cymbal stands. :D

Sans rack, on most kits there's usually a stand nearby anyway, unless the kit is pretty sparse. Hanging FT's do require one bracket, but a FT with legs requires three. Re: "extra" hardware- I'd posit that it's just different hardware. the single bracket, mount of whatever type (usually a RIMS style thing), and clamp is present instead of the two additional brackets and 3 legs that go into the brackets.
 
Sometimes yes, Sometimes no. Got fed up of it on my Tama Superstar so got a cradle for it. Much better & was told it looked "Cute"...........

IMG_0871 by Kevin Frost, on Flickr
 
Technically yes. I current;y have a PDP EZ kit, and I mounted the 13" rack tom to act as a floor tom since it's huge ... so yes.
 
What do people think are the negatives for a hanging tom? I don't get it.

They're big and heavy (16x16, 18x16).
I like them perfectly flat.
They're floor toms.
 
They're big and heavy (16x16, 18x16).
I like them perfectly flat.
They're floor toms.
I've never seen a hanging 18. Usually the 14s and 16s are not "square" sizes, but 11x14, 13x16.
I hang mine flat.
 
I've never seen a hanging 18. Usually the 14s and 16s are not "square" sizes, but 11x14, 13x16.
I hang mine flat.

I would probably hang those also. It's practical for shallower toms and looks better too. If floor toms are all legs they look top heavy like they're on stilts.
 
I like to be able to adjust the floor tom position without hassle. I also prefer the deader, deeper sound of a standing floor.
i totally understand those that wants consistency between a rack tom sound and a hanging floor, but it’s not for me.
 
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