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Rogers Bass Drum Dilema

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I have been slowly putting together a Rogers Holiday blue glitter kit from various orphans. The mounted tom and floor tom were picked up separately, all hardware removed and cleaned and the shells rewrapped; I'm happy with the results and they sound great. Then a couple of weeks ago I got the following bass drum shell from Ebay for $50 (plus $50 shipping... a little high but whatever). Here's the item #:

191196754542

I got the shell and was pleasantly surprised by the condition.... very minor bearing edge repair but the wrap was very bright just like the new wrap on the toms. I put on the lugs, mounts and hoops that I had been saving up but when I put the heads on, I realized that the tension rods (period correct Rogers) were too short and wont reach the lugs by around half an inch, maybe more.

I had some longer t rods around so just went with those, thinking I was just doing something dumb and I wanted to hear what it sounded like. When I went to mount the tom, I realized that the tom mount on the bass drum was toward the front edge of the bass drum and consequently uncomfortably close to me. More frustration.

Now after thinking about it, I believe the bass drum might have originally been a Tower model with center lugs that someone added extra holes to make it a 'Holiday' model (sort of).

I double checked all measurements and can verify the following:

- Hoops are correct width, but original T rods don't reach lugs

- Hole spacing on the inner holes of the lugs are the same width as Tower lugs, suggesting Tower lugs were originally fitted

- No paper badge on the interior and no tell tale washer imprints... maybe it was repainted at some point.

The more I think about this, the more I am convinced that I've got a Tower shell that was drilled for holiday lugs. The final thing that convinced me was that tom mounts on Tower kits seem to mount further to the front on the bass drum.

Can anyone shed light on this and confirm what I'm thinking is correct? The wrap is so nice that I don't want to return it to the seller even if it is does have extra holes. I would probably just use it as is with long non original t rods and mount the tom on a snare stand to get over the 'too close' issue.

Any thoughts?

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Posted on 10 years ago
#1
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Well, if you read the description in the listing you provided, the seller states it's a Tower Bass Drum shell, drilled for Holiday Beavertail lugs. Perhaps it could have been worded better to avoid any confusion, but technically it was correct.

Hope that helps.

Posted on 10 years ago
#2
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Well what do you know.... it simply never registered when I initially bought it, not being much of a Rogers guy. Thanks for pointing out what was right in front of me. But I wonder why the hell someone would do this??? Whatever, I'll go with the longer t rods and be done with it. It still sounds good though.....

Posted on 10 years ago
#3
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The tom mount and the hex cymbal rod mount are in the standard Tower location as well. Some of the Holiday drums were laid out the same way. One point of caution is that use of the tom mount in that location tends to make the setup unstable unless the cymbal rod (with a cymbal on it) is used. So the stand is a good option. Pick up a couple of aftermarket blank plates for the unused mount locations and use those longer rods you have, and you're off and running.

Posted on 10 years ago
#4
Posts: 1460 Threads: 87
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Another option for the tom mounting is use a long arm and set the tom in a reverse position. back over the bd. That was done using a different angle mount on the bd, but did away with the tilting over of the bd.

Posted on 10 years ago
#5
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Still another option would be to drill (:eek:OMG!) and remount a straight tom collet plate on the top of the bass where it would be more comfortable and playable for you; afterall, this shell has already been redrilled for the Beavertails and it's no longer in its original factory configuaration anyway. Since you can't "undrill" the modifications already done to this bass, you might as well make it playable.

Mike

-No Guru... still learning more every day-
Posted on 10 years ago
#6
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