cdrums21
Gold Member
Hey everyone,
So I recently purchased a Ludwig classic maple kit with a 24" x 14" kick drum. Before that I had a DW 22" x 18" kick drum. With the DW kick, it was very easy to tune and sounded punchy with nice low end. In fact, any 22" drum I have ever owned (Yamaha, Ludwig, DW) has always been easy to get a good sound out of for rock. The Ludwig 24" sounds good, but I am still tweaking it and experimenting and am finding the tuning to be going against what I normally do. I know that the 24" batter head needs to be tuned up a bit higher to get the shell engaged and have the drum sound full with a nice tone. Too loose and it's all attack, no body. I have the batter head tuned to where it feels and sounds good, (it's at an "F"- 87 hz. for tune bot guys, of which I don't own). I'm happy with that. I normally tune my resonant head a little higher, but with this drum...I'm running in to a bit of a quandary. I have a 4" hole at the 4 o'clock position on the resonant head with a DW hourglass pillow lightly touching both heads for muffling. I have a clear P3 on the batter head and a smooth white ambassador for the resonant head. If I tune the resonant head up higher than the batter like I normally do, it sounds full and cuts, but lacks some low end. If I tune the resonant head below the batter, the nice low end is there but it is slightly less "present" acoustically when playing in a band context. I am an experienced player and tuner, so it's not a tuning technique issue. I also have been playing Remo heads forever and am quite happy with them, so a head swap doesn't interest me. I'm just not sure if this is common with 14" depth bass drums and am curious to know how those of you who have the same size kick drum tune their resonant head in relation to the batter. I know shell construction (3 ply as opposed to thicker shells) will have some impact on the sound and tuning as well. I am after as big a sound as I can get with the kit tuned in a way to sound best 10 feet in front of the kit rather than at the throne. The rest of the kit sounds killer, just looking for some feedback. Anyone care to chime in?
So I recently purchased a Ludwig classic maple kit with a 24" x 14" kick drum. Before that I had a DW 22" x 18" kick drum. With the DW kick, it was very easy to tune and sounded punchy with nice low end. In fact, any 22" drum I have ever owned (Yamaha, Ludwig, DW) has always been easy to get a good sound out of for rock. The Ludwig 24" sounds good, but I am still tweaking it and experimenting and am finding the tuning to be going against what I normally do. I know that the 24" batter head needs to be tuned up a bit higher to get the shell engaged and have the drum sound full with a nice tone. Too loose and it's all attack, no body. I have the batter head tuned to where it feels and sounds good, (it's at an "F"- 87 hz. for tune bot guys, of which I don't own). I'm happy with that. I normally tune my resonant head a little higher, but with this drum...I'm running in to a bit of a quandary. I have a 4" hole at the 4 o'clock position on the resonant head with a DW hourglass pillow lightly touching both heads for muffling. I have a clear P3 on the batter head and a smooth white ambassador for the resonant head. If I tune the resonant head up higher than the batter like I normally do, it sounds full and cuts, but lacks some low end. If I tune the resonant head below the batter, the nice low end is there but it is slightly less "present" acoustically when playing in a band context. I am an experienced player and tuner, so it's not a tuning technique issue. I also have been playing Remo heads forever and am quite happy with them, so a head swap doesn't interest me. I'm just not sure if this is common with 14" depth bass drums and am curious to know how those of you who have the same size kick drum tune their resonant head in relation to the batter. I know shell construction (3 ply as opposed to thicker shells) will have some impact on the sound and tuning as well. I am after as big a sound as I can get with the kit tuned in a way to sound best 10 feet in front of the kit rather than at the throne. The rest of the kit sounds killer, just looking for some feedback. Anyone care to chime in?