Hello folks, I'm new to these forums, and this being my first post I figured I'd introduce myself here. I'm Mike, and my pride and joy is a 1969 Rogers Holiday Londoner outfit from Dayton in black diamond pearl wrap which I've owned for about 17 or 18 years now. I use both a late-60s Gretsch wood snare wrapped in white marine pearl and a 1968 Ludwig Supraphonic depending on my mood.
That said, I just picked up this MIJ kit in fairly sad shape on Monday for $125. So while I'm not new to vintage drums, this will be my first restoration. Not sure what my end goal will be, but I have some ideas. The drums included in the sale were a 14x22 kick, 9x13 rack tom, 5x14 snare, all with Lyra badges, and a 14x14 6-lug floor with a Majestic badge (though I think I recall the seller's ad described it as a Whitehall). Also included was the tom arm with what looks to be a mount for an additional accessory, a straight cymbal stand (brand unknown), a brown metal disc that some might say resembles a cymbal, both in appearance and sound (though I have my doubts), and a CB-700 chain driven kick pedal.
The Lyra drums look to be 3-ply luan while the Majestic FT is 1-ply, all with reinforcement rings. One of the previous owners (not the guy I bought it from) added some pretty ugly copper contact paper over the original vinyl wrap, which is blue glitter. The guy who sold it to me stripped the paper off the snare, and yesterday I stripped the two toms down to the original wrap (pictures to come later). All resonant heads, hoops and tension rods are missing, the snare is has no strainer, butt, or snares, the floor tom has a snare side hoop on top (but can't be used for the snare due to the number of lugs), and a couple lugs are missing their mounting screws or washers...but all the existing hardware, with a few exceptions, seems to be in pretty decent shape with little rust and pitting.
The original blue glitter wrap looks to be in ok shape, but it's hard to tell because the contact paper left a pretty thick layer of adhesive all over the wrap. I'd love to find a magic solution to strip the adhesive without damaging the vinyl (so far I've tried Goof Off, non-acetone nail polish remover, and hot water, and only the hot water gave adequate results without damaging the wrap), but I feel that even if I managed to get rid of it all, it would take a miracle to get the finish to shine again. I'm leaning towards rewrapping it, but I'd prefer not to spend money if I don't have to.
So, back to what ideas I have for this kit, none of which are set in stone:
1. Full restoration, keeping as close to original as possible, then sell.
2. Full restoration, rewrapped in a different color, then sell (or keep if I get attached :cool: ).
And then there's this 3rd option that keeps nagging at me...
3. I'm most excited about this 14" floor tom--it's a pretty rare and thus very sought-after size for Rogers owners--so depending on how it sounds (it actually sounds pretty good even with no resonant head and an old Remo Emperor batter), I've considered filling/redrilling to be an 8-lug drum, finding some more Rogers beavertail lugs, wrapping it in BDP and adding it to my Rogers kit. Obviously this would require the most work and the results may disappoint (we're talking a MIJ single-ply Phillipine mahogany imposter surrounded by arguably the zenith of American-made vintage maple drums), so I'm still up in the air on this option...plus it would potentially make the rest of the kit harder to sell without a floor tom.
So this thread will document the restoration process. All comments and suggestions are welcome! Glad to be a part of this forum.
Now for the photos...first, some eye candy!
1969 Rogers Holiday - 8x12, 9x13, 16x16, 14x20, with 5x14 Gretsch snare
[IMG]http://i755.photobucket.com/albums/xx197/Vater/Drums/IMG_4417.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i755.photobucket.com/albums/xx197/Vater/Drums/IMG_4418.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i755.photobucket.com/albums/xx197/Vater/Drums/IMG_4420.jpg[/IMG]
