Yes, professional grade drum kits are pushed!

M

Matt Bo Eder

Guest
Just an FYI for those of you who cherish your drums. There is a reason you buy pro-grade stuff. Out here in Southern California, we're going through a bit of a cold snap and last night here at the magic kingdom, we had our annual New Year's Eve party where the parks stay open until 4AM. Well, our temperatures got down to around 35 degrees last night, and we have a stage in the New Orleans section that's actually a big elevator and when the band is done for the night, it goes down into the ground. Well, that didn't happen last night.

Our little Yamaha Club Custom kit sat up and exposed on that stage for the last 24 hours at least and was completely covered with dew (or the water from the sprinkler systems in the planters), and was a little iced over when I got to the stage this morning to prep the stage for park opening at 8AM. I turned on the stage lights and even in 40-degree weather, the stage heated up a bit to make things touchable for me. Probably bad for the wood to be heated that quickly, though.

So I dried off the kit best I could and gave the heads a tweak and the kit sounds ok. Those Club Custom shells are pretty stout, that kit's been on that stage for a little over a year now and it's holding up considering the weather it's been through. There's also a Yamaha upright piano on that stage that at least gets covered with a cheap vinyl cover, but I'm sure both of those instruments are just going through trauma on that stage.

Something to think about as you carefully store your kit in cases before gently transporting them to your next gig, eh?
 
...and was completely covered with dew

Glad it wasn't covered with doo... I hear that Goofy and Pluto have the run of the park at night!

Sorry, I didn't really have anything constructive to add.

Bermuda
 
Glad it wasn't covered with doo... I hear that Goofy and Pluto have the run of the park at night!

Sorry, I didn't really have anything constructive to add.

Bermuda

That could happen too. There is a family of real cats that comes out at night, and somebody even feeds them (I've found plates of cat food on the stage once).

But one thing to remember about this little kingdom - there really is no time when it's closed and nothing is going on. As soon as it clears out, the trucks and crews come in to re-stock and clean it up for the next day, and we have maintenance teams to fix stuff, and they usually wrap up their work by about the time the park opens again. It's just this endless cycle....
 
Pff, 35 degrees?! For the past week it's been in the negatives all during the day and around -30 to -40 with wind chill at night. I don't think any outside gigs are possible around here right now :)
 
Pff, 35 degrees?! For the past week it's been in the negatives all during the day and around -30 to -40 with wind chill at night. I don't think any outside gigs are possible around here right now :)

Hey, I said "Southern California". We'll take one of your kits and leave it outside in your area for a couple of days ;)
 
That's good news for me. I like Yamaha drums.

Actually drums are a pretty tough musical instrument. They take a lot of abuse compared to other instruments.

.
 
If I had Disney's budget, I could keep everything I own outside all winter long. Then replace it as I felt needed. But I understand the point you're making about well-built gear holding together better and longer.
 
If I had Disney's budget, I could keep everything I own outside all winter long. Then replace it as I felt needed. But I understand the point you're making about well-built gear holding together better and longer.

Well, don't think this stuff isn't replaced on a regular basis. About every three-four years heavily used gear gets replaced. Most of our audio gear in all the venues are running 24/7 so about five years is the lifespan for that stuff.
 
Pff, 35 degrees?! For the past week it's been in the negatives all during the day and around -30 to -40 with wind chill at night. I don't think any outside gigs are possible around here right now :)

No kidding. I brought my gear in from the trunk of the car and my hardware frosted over like a beer mug out of the freezer, lol. I've played gigs at 35 degrees, with a space heater it's no problem!
 
It reminds me of an old story about Jason Newstead.

Back when he was with Metallica, he requested basses from several manufactures to be as water proof as possible, due to the amount of sweat the basses get covered in over the course of a tour.

So to test them, the put the basses in the bathtub full of water for x-number of hours, and then tried playing them. Then he bought 5 of the ones that held up to the test.

I'd suspect most well made drums would hold up to being left outside every once great in a while. But few would do well if it happened to them all the time.
 
You played in 40 degree weather? Woah I'm outta there. I don't play if it's less than 70 degrees.
 
Andy can correct me on this if I'm wrong, but I think that resiliency is one of the strengths that multi-ply drum shells have going for them.
 
It's true that ply drums are a more durable construction compared to the steambent, stave and segmented. However they are all basically equal when it comes to water compromising where it's glued. I think. It seems like the bearing edges and vents are the only places where you can see the individual plies, so these would be the areas that water would penetrate first, I'm guessing.

The finish on the face of the drum, be it lacquer, wrap or whatever (not fur) should block any water penetration. Any seams are the vulnerable point.

Water...or just condensation...not good for the hardware especially inside the lugs where you can't see anything
 
Wasnt there some Yamaha artist talking about his kit being submerged in Hurricane Katrina flooding for a number of days. Supposedly he took it all apart, put the hardware in bags of rice, let the shells air dry and they were good to go after a few days.

I forgot who that guy was though.
 
Wasnt there some Yamaha artist talking about his kit being submerged in Hurricane Katrina flooding for a number of days. Supposedly he took it all apart, put the hardware in bags of rice, let the shells air dry and they were good to go after a few days.

I forgot who that guy was though.

There were a couple guys from Nashville who were boasting about how well their Pearl shells held up after their flood a few years ago.

http://pearldrum.com/news-events/artist-news/a-tale-of-pearl-artists-during-the-nashville-floods
 
Wasnt there some Yamaha artist talking about his kit being submerged in Hurricane Katrina flooding for a number of days. Supposedly he took it all apart, put the hardware in bags of rice, let the shells air dry and they were good to go after a few days.

I forgot who that guy was though.

Dave McAfee from Toby Keith's band if I remember correctly.
 
Which is why I learned a long time ago, to coat the inner shells and bearing edges with 3-4 coats of 100% Tung Oil...

Moisture, humidity has no effect on shells, water is repelled away...has no tonal effect on the drums...in fact some say, it enhances them.
 
We had similar issues up at Griffith Park this past October.
We kept our kit set up for the whole month. Only played 4 nights a week, and just left it on stage the rest of the week. We didn't have a nice Yamaha kit though, we had a PDP Concept Series. Kept up okay but we had torrential downpour on Halloween. Those drums got rocked! No idea what condition they are in now. They went into storage after the residency ended.
 
Andy can correct me on this if I'm wrong, but I think that resiliency is one of the strengths that multi-ply drum shells have going for them.
Correct, multiple ply shells are inherently more stable, & the more plies the better in terms of stability. The massive glue bond area responsible for that stability is the same element responsible for reduced resonance performance in terms of fundamental presence. That said, a dimensionally correct shell is a contributing factor towards good sonic performance, so choose your weapon accordingly :)
 
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