If you are trying to keep them original, why not stay with bare wood. On my original 1950's Kent kit, I left it bare wood on the insides. As far as protection, I have heads on both sides of my drums so the exposure of the wood to the elements of nature is minor. The insides of my 1950's drums are not dirty and still have their natural light color. As far as visual appeal, I do not use clear heads so nobody is going to see the insides of the drums anyway. As far as sound effect, I have heard that adding any sort of paint or sealant is subtly dampening the natural vibrations and resonance of the shell, just like slapping layers of paint or a sealant on guitar bodies. It probably has less effect with drums compared to guitars but it was one more reason to discourage me from painting or sealing the insides.

Thanks! That helps. I always keep solid heads on my drums, but unfortunately when you're buying old drum kits and they've been sitting for years with one head or none, it makes you worry if the exposure has dried the wood out any. I suppose I could put a polish on it, justr to give the interiors a little life. I had an old fiddle that belonged to my great grandfather, and a fiddle restorer gave me some kind of liquid to help with the wood being dried out. That might be the ticket.

Good luck and keep us posted! I would be curious to see your results. From my experience with guitars I learned that a well-dried wood guitar body has a sharper, clearer and more resonant tone because there is less moisture in the pores of the wood (keeping those tiny resonant and echoing chambers open) and less water weight dampening the vibrations of the wood. Newer guitar bodies that may not be properly dried or guitars that spend too much time in overly-humid environments have a duller, more muffled sound with less sustain. However, too much drying and the thin wood of an acoustic guitar can risk cracking, which is why you see all those expensive, well-regulated humidifier devices for expensive acoustic guitars. The cracking problem is not as bad with thicker, solid-body guitars so you see a lot more vintage folks appreciating the resonant tone of an older solid-body electric that has never seen a humidifier or a humid or moist environment. Drum shells are much thicker than acoustic guitars so maybe a well-dried old drum shell is more akin to an old solid-body guitar rather than an acoustic one.

Toddyjoe. Could you post pictures of the Kent set? Also are you sure

its a 1950's? What badge does it have? Also rail mount or Kent mount?

Is it a "Clubdate" style or single ended lugs?

Bebop, I can try to take some pics but the best comparison in terms of hardware is the picture of the white marine pearl kit at the very top of this page which is IDENTICAL to my kit (except for a floor tom which I do not have):

http://www.coopersvintagedrums.com/misc/kenthistory.htm

On my kit, there is no date stamp on the inside of the shells but my uncle says he got them as a kid in the mid-1950's so it is not a 60's drum according to his recollection. The white marine pearl wrap is fairly yellowed on mine. The foil badges are the white flower with gold lettering just like the ones in the pic above. The original cymbal mount is a straight vertical post mounted to the bass shell in the front center of the drum which slides into the shell when not in use, just like the pic above. The top threaded portion of my cymbal stand broke in half some years ago in storage so I extended the threaded portion with a coupler nut and headless, 1/4" x 20 threaded bolt so that I could have enough length to mount a cymbal with felt washers. The bass drum spurs use the same slide-out mechanism as the cymbal mount, just like the pic above. The bass drum has the original calf-skin heads but the calf-skin heads on the tom were shreaded when I got it back a couple of months ago and have been replaced with Remos.

The original tom mount on my kit was a Kent hoop mount as in the same top pic in the page above. The mounting brackets on the tom itself is also the same: diamond plate on the tom with a slot which slides over a short tongue on the hoop-mount bracket. The original hoop mount got lost a few years back so I put a non-original Ludwig consolette on it this year. I always like the look of the consolette and it looks far more stable than the original hoop mount would have been.

The rims and single-ended lug mounts for the bass and tom shells are identical to the ones in the pic above, as is the inlayed black hoops on the bass drum. The only thing I am missing is the American flag head and the floor tom. :)

The snare that came with my kit is also yellowed white marine pearl. However, hardware-wise it best resembles the black pearl snare that is five pictures from the top on the page above. My snare has the same rims, same joint lugs and same crude, old-fashioned string strainer as in that picture. The original heads on the snare were replaced by my uncle years back and only his replacement batter head with the bare black stamp of "Weather King" remains intact. I am keeping that old head off the kit for now and have new Remo heads on the snare.

Somewhere lost in a storage barn belonging to my friend's father is the original snare stand so I am currently using an older Ludwig snare stand instead of the Kent one. All the other accessories -- drum throne, cymbals, cymbal stands -- did not come with the kit and are non-Kent.

Very cool Toddyjoe.

I just wanted to make sure it was a '50s kit because generally you dont

see very many 50's Kents.

I just picked up another ginger-aled silver sparkle 22" bass drum shell that

has the lugs, telescopic cymbal holder (through shell just like yours)

same spurs as yours and the rail mount ( 2 hole). Just gotta get some t-rods

(I believe gretsch used the same ones) and butterfly claws and some hoops.

What heads do you use on the bass? On my set I use coated ambassador batter

head and an original Kent weather king head on the resonant side. Than coated

amb. over clear amb. all around.