Can the shells on snare drums (solid shell radio kings) 'suddenly' go out of round/warped within a shorter period of time. Obviously it's well known that this often happens over a long period of time ( decades) with vintage drums. I've had 2 of these drums for approx 12 months,but just about every day that I've had them I've literally being picking them up from where they are ( either on top of the bed or on their side on the floor) then flipping them over- put on side on floor playing and tapping a bit- then probably taking them to the other room- place on stand play- maybe experiment with the tuning, then maybe moving to the other room change heads or something ETC. on and on.... Wow - totally obsessive I know ! :o in other words I've been manhandling them quite a lot and I've just suddenly come to my senses a bit and thought that I could actually putting quite a lot of stress on the shells. What made me think this was that after changing the heads over again I just can't get it to sound right again it's gone all ringy and has a terrible overtone it's never sounded as bad, and it's even harder to tune than ever . I won't go on to much here on the details of the sound. But It's just started to really BUG me that maybe I might have accelerated any out of roundness issues. What do the experts think?.
Shells getting out of round? Last viewed: 1 second ago
Hopefully not though I hope. Of course I realise I could quite easily have just lost my killer tuning but can this happen so easily I'm always ' carefull ' with them.
I didn't mean to press that smiley caption
Have you actually measured the drum to see if it is in fact out of round? Are the heads calf? If the heads were seated in a certain position on the rim, rotating the head to a different position on the edges 'might' account for the tuning difficulty. Impossible to tell what may be causing it without having the drum in front of me so I can inspect it.
It may not be out of round at all, measure and make sure. Head changes are more likely the culprit.
John
Ok, I feel a bit of an idiot chances are it is just due to changing over, no I'm not using calf. I just suddenly thought I could have actually warped the shell lifting the drum around so much.?
Hopefully I will be able to get it good again.. It's always realy hard to get the heads on it evenly tuned
Radio kings are notoriously famous for this due to the fact that during the 30's and 40's gene krupas fame had the factory working 24/7 filling orders they would send RK's out the door with green wood, the calf skin heads were essentially made for each drum. over time the flesh hood really did a number on the RK shells.
Yeah but it's my 60 s one that I'm mainly talking about.
Ok, I feel a bit of an idiot chances are it is just due to changing over, no I'm not using calf. I just suddenly thought I could have actually warped the shell lifting the drum around so much.?
You did not do anything wrong. You are fine.
Drums warp due to moisture and heat.
Just keep your drums indoors and don't let them walk out in the rain and then come back in and sit by the fire.
Don't let them take a walk outside in the blazing sun and come back and jump in the pool.
Changing heads is just fine.
Next time you have the heads off put it on a board or cardboard and trace the outline. Or just use a tape measure from side to side in different places to check round.
Hope he/she is in good round.
Have a round on me.
sa in california
Thanks to Mr. Jerry Jenkins
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