It's not wood that you're describing. It's a type of paint that many manufacturers use to seal the interiors of the drum.

The swingstar line was Tama's entry level kit. I owned one for years untill it was stollen from me. I played it on alot of gigs, it served me well. Sound was not bad if you get good heads and tune it right. The snare was not all that great, but got the job done.

As far as the shell, I'm thinking it was a composite material and not wood at all.

Juju

It is a coating....affectionately referred to as Zola Coat....a speckled paint. It is used to cover the imperfections in lower line drums - in this case the drums are made of luan mahogany. My guess is the drums were made in the 80's.

There are various arguments as to whether or not the sound of the drum is affected. My personal belief is that there is possibly a small amount of dampening, which on a lower quality shell, can generally be considered a good thing.

Ludwig used this coating on their Rocker series. It was also used on some of the Standard series shells as well.

thanks alot everybody.

at first glance it did seem like dense wood chips and glue type of thing.

closer inspection of a drum's edges revealed a texture similar to that of regular drums.

local drum dealers (israel) suggested that they were made from cardboard

(they did not view the shells though) and mentioned that some manufacturers used to make cardboard kits in the past..