5-Star Zyn were made at the Premier factory and were their top-of-the-line cymbal offering, vs. the regular Zyn trash-can lids. Pretty nice cymbals, and hard to find, especially in the USA.

Next Sunday I'll have a complete set for auction on eBay. These that I'm selling were the older ones that simply have "Super Zyn" in the trademark. The "5 star Super Zyn" are the same thing but were manufactured much later.

Hope you don't think I'm "whacked", but I have another interesting tidbit for you.

These cymbals were made by Italians. Italian P.O.W.'s captured by the British in WWII. They were pressed into service making cymbals for Premier.

The American's got the German rocket scientists,....and the Brits got the Italian cymbal makers. Go figure.

A very interesting tidbit!! Thanks for that info!

Thanks for the info. The reason I was asking is because I've found a set of 5 star super zyn 14" hi hats. They have $150 on them. So I was wondering whether or not to go with them at that Price etc.

That's a reasonable price. Are they "down under"?

Cool! Yeah "down-under". I'll get them and let you know how I go. Thanks gurus! I'm really stoked I found this forum, everyone is very helpful and it's rad sharing the knowledge around :)

Back in the late 90's, I contacted Premier Canada about Zyn cymbals because a major Drum shop in Toronto was still selling them brand new. I got a letter from the President(maybe General Manager?) of Premier Canada which stated that they had recently been discontinued and that they had been made by a major Cymbal mfg. The reason stated for the discontinuance was, that Premier had just become the distributor for Paiste Cymbals ,so they didn't need the Zyn line anymore.He went on to say that they compared favourably with the 400 series from Paiste----- so it is safe to assume that Paiste was the maker. I have quite a few Zyn,Zyn 5***** ,Super Zyn, Krut and Beverley cymbals(I think these were all made in the same factory) and quite honestly none of them resemble any 400 series Paiste that I have ever been around. As far as the story about Italian P.O.W.s making them, I believe that is true but at some time it must have become uneconomical for Premier to carry the factory and they turned production over to Paiste. I think they dropped the 5 Star line even ****her back because it is only relatively recently that Paiste started making any cymbals from castings, so, I doubt that they made any hammered cast bronze cymbals for Premier.

5 Stars and Super Zyns are very good cymbals in deed and to be fair not all of the standard ones are potlids. What seems to get missed a lot is the "sweet weight" of a cymbal. I've got a pair of heavy 12" A's that will blow the bells off of any other 12" pair I have heard and most 13s and 14s,a pair of fairly heavy 13" Paiste Signatures that make my old light 13" K's sound like they were pressed out of Baklava not Bronze and a pair of light Krut 14's that although they are not stupendous are very very good. I had a pair of Krut 12's and they were dismal(sold them for 50.00, to someone after I let him play them for a few days---yeaaaaaa!). Each metal has its sweet weight coupled with its purpose. It's a delicate and sometimes elusive ratio. Take these Ajax as an example. I've got two 18". One is 1234 gm. and the other is 1452 gm. Ajax were cheap spun cymbals(they left the hammering up to the end user) offered by Boosey&Hawkes as a low end , school band,entry level cymbal, similar to the Nickel/Silver Zyns and Paistes and Meinls. They also sold A. Zildjian as their top line cymbal. In the case of these two----in all other ways, they seem the same, shape, bell size and conformation, colour of alloy but the lighter one at an average of .88 mm thick is tinny as a ride and loud,sharp caustic,and brash as a crash.It decays almost immediately. It's not really an acceptable cymbal for anything, yet the heavier one at an average of 1.00mm thick is very similar in character to my 17" K. It has a bright shimmery yet deep ping with a delicious dark wash that almost makes you want to eat it(is that why they call them pies?). It is a dark crash, with a long decay. I'm a big fan of small compact kits and love the idea of one crash/ride mounted on the bass and a pair of small hats.This Ajax cymbal is almost perfect for that application, yet its sister cymbal would be embarrassing. So----to get back to your 14" 5 Stars. I have a pair and I consider them very good, a little more satiny, than the 14" A's that I have but well within the same overall quality parameters; maybe a little more similar to the hand hammered Zilcos, that came out of the now Sabian factory or older Toscos. Mine weigh 803 gm. and 903 gm. One other thing; I have cymbals labelled Super Zyn and Zyn 5 *****. They all say Made in England. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that they were rotocast, possibly arriving in England as rotocast blanks from Italy and then hammered and finished in England? The Super Zyns appear to be hand hammered or possibly a combination of hand and machine hammered and the 5***** appear to be machine hammered. The alloy seems to be the same. Hope this all helps and good luck with your cymbals.

The Super Zyns were definitely not roto-cast. They were made from cast ingots. The Super Zyns are often seen with a myriad of charcoal pits especially on their undersides; a true hallmark of old school Turkish style cast cymbals.