Throwing good money after bad

M

Mustion

Senior Member
I have a little bop kit I built out of spare drums I had and since the floor tom-turned kick now has an unused leg bracket, I decided to get a cymbal arm for it. The hardware for this kit is Tama so in the interest of keeping it in the family I settled on the one that they sell, which is made for their Club Jam Mini kit. Looking on the internet, I see most places have it for $56.99, except one that had it for about $44. Naturally, I buy that one. When it I finally arrives weeks later (the dealer had to special order it from Tama), to my dismay I see that it's the top part only, and does not have the L-rod included. Thinking this can't be right, I look at the listing on the vendor's website, and though it says so in vague and awkward terms that one could easily miss, it is indeed listed as just that half of the whole unit. I then research their return policy, which of course excludes special-order items such as this one, so I am stuck now.

Fine. I do some looking around and buy the Tama 10.5mm L rod, a $15 investment. I know at this point I'm spending more than if I had bought the unit whole elsewhere, but I kinda have no other choice. Sure enough, when it arrives--it's too big. The cymbal arm sleeve is for 9mm. My fault for not measuring, but still... gah!!!

So now I'm wondering--do I try to get a return on this too-big L arm, buy the proper size, and continue; or do I just cut my losses and try to sell off this half a cymbal arm? Who would buy such a thing? At this point it is $44 for the arm top section, $15 for another L rod, plus the cost of shipping the wrong size one back for a refund. So I'll be in over sixty bucks by then. Throwing good money after bad.

And the joke? I just looked up this cymbal arm online 'cause I forgot the name of the kit Tama makes it for... and I see GC slashed the price on the full unit, which is now $49.99...
 
If you intend to use the kit on a regular basis going forward for some years, why not make it's setup work for your playing, if the parts are available?

I bought a Sonor Safari kit around 7 years ago and spent a few bucks upgrading different parts (bought it cheap but had to spend around $100 to retrofit some items the seller had taken off). It seemed worthwhile to do so since I used it for gigs every now and then and the drumming experience was enjoyable and worked for me
 
Just suck it up and buy the çorrect L-arm. You will use the spare somewhere. Don't fret. I do these kind of mistakes all the time.

GeeDeeEmm
 
You can make a 9mm cymbal arm fit a 10.5mm L-rod with a tack weld.
 
If you are using the same kit a few years from now and are happy with it, then you won't care about the dollars lost. Sometimes you just have to step back and say that it was a little lesson learned, and hopefully it will inspire you to play it, enjoy it, and get your money's worth out of it.

When I've overpaid for stuff in the past, I've tried to have the attitude of, "Well, I guess I'll just have to use it and enjoy it that much more!" ?
 
Don't worry about it . It all comes out in the wash-you'll probably find a use for it later-or find that you spent more on a fancy dinner and you flushed the remains of that down the toilet the next day. So penny wise and don't forget to wash your hands after you flush.
 
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