If you have no real experience with a router and table,send them out to be done.

One "ah sh-t" wipes out a whole days worth of "attaboys". And will make them useless to play and will need to be recut then reedged. Even more money.

Try Precision Drums although they are about the same price but do excellent

work. Unless you can find someone near you and then eliminate the additional shipping costs. And yes,post pics!

Cheers,BigE

I can see a constant ..bad tune or good tune`n,..but a change`n tune ??!!

Stretching heads or rollback lugs maybe,...I would make sure of what`s happening first. Trueing and re-cutting bearring edges changes the length of the drum.

Hi Rogers77!

I can empathize with you on the bearing edge dilemma. While many people claim to be able to do bearing edges, make sure you know who they are and the quality of work they do. I've had drum work from Bill Detamore, of Pork Pie, and have been very pleased. However, I normally entrust my bearing edges to either Precision Drum Company in New York, or Heuer's Drum Lab in Glendale, CA. Chris Heuer does wonderful work, but is a one-man operation, so wait times can be long. Precision Drum has a fairly quick turn-around time. Even though I'm in California, I'm sending my new PDP X7 kit to Precision next week for new edges. The labor alone for edges on all 7 drums, which also includes new snare beds on the snare drum, will cost $290. Factor in shipping both directions and the cost can get pricey. However, I love my PDP kit and feel that the edges I'm getting, with the attention to detail Precision does, makes it worth it. They also do many different edge styles. I'm getting a style not even listed on there website; it's a roundover/45.

Only you can decide what your kit is worth. Don't take the chance on making a mistake on your vintage kit if you've never done edges before!

Let us know what you decide to do!

Take the heads off the drum and lay it flat on a solid surface like a granite counter top if you can. See if it rocks at all. Then put a small flashlight inside on the counter and move it around shining at the edge.This way you can see where the problems are by looking from the outside at the bearing edge.

I have found with the Fullerton era drums I own out of 6 toms they all rock a bit. But they are tunable. I took one of the worst and trued the edge on my flat sand table. Then filed the edge very carefully back to original contour. It was all it needed to true up. This is a players kit tom drum, and it sounds much better to my ears. Eventually they will be rewrapped and edged when I get some time. Again don't try anything drastic till you've really tried tuning and different head combos etc. If the head keeps loosening up the problem lies elsewhere. Pics please. And welcome to the forum. I forgot my manners.

Cheers,BigE

Thank you for all your replies! I've decided to take them down to Pork Pie to have the bearing edges redone. And I'm pretty sure it's the bearing edges. It's not that they detune really fast. The 12" tom is the better of the two toms (only by a bit though), and I rarely have to tune it back up to pitch (I like my toms to SING!). The 13" is really bad because the bearing edge is only 45 degrees in one spot that's about 3" long. And that's only the batter side! The bass drums are a NIGHTMARE. I can never get them to sound the same, and since I have clear heads, I took a look at the edges. As a side note, my set originally came with one bass drum and I bought another one in the same era and brought it back to life; it's not the same color, but I don't care since this set isn't coming out of the house. Anyway, the edges of the bass drums on the front side alone were bad. The bass drum that came with the set was mediocre at best and the other one I bought later one was truly a mess. Not one part was at the 45-45 degrees that Rogers intended. I've talked with Bill Detamore and he's given me the rundown of what they'll do and how they do it. The only thing I'm worried about is how much shorter the shell will be when it's done.

BTW, here's a picture of my set. If you were wondering, I set up the toms like marching tenor drums. And that silver "tom" is actually an old snare and I just stripped the snare unit off. It sounds decent, but I want to get another floor tom sometime in the future.

[IMG]http://i54.tinypic.com/261env9.jpg[/IMG]

So I got the bearing edges re-done and BOY DO THE DRUMS SING!!! I brought them home from Pork Pie and I couldn't stop playing them!! I got them cut at a 60º bearing edge and they sound fantastic. Bill Detamore, the president and guy who fixed my drums, seems to know a lot about Rogers drums and he said he's done many Rogers drums too. I am very happy with his work and the drums sound so much better on the recordings I do now!