That is pretty close to the truth, I would think. I won't be around but no-doubt, 40 years hence there will be a whole cult of re-inactors and rebuilders searching out mint condition dollar store brooms and fly swatters and copies of Jockey undies and fake Rolex watches and bogus Ray Ban sunglasses.....

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... That's how it was with stencils. The two companies were Star and Pearl, and each unique MIJ brand could have it's own lug design, wrap, mouting system (Label), shell composition (Slightly different taste/sound) etc. ...

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NO. If all those sub-brands would have 'own lug designs' or 'own mounting systems' - we would NOT be able to source out from whom a drumset of that era has come from !

Furtheron it wouldn't make sense 'cause unique designs would have lead to rising production costs. In contrast, they used the same parts for bigger production units and to lower the costs.

We are only able to identificate those kits because they all have the SAME 'lug design' or 'mounting system', if produced by STAR (and that's valid for all Pearl kits as well - with Pearl-style 'lug design' and 'mounting systems')!

;)

Ralf

I agree Ralf, but I think you might be taking me a bit TOO literally. Not all Star kits had the exact same shells, lugs, tom mounts, cymbal holders etc. Same with Pearl made stuff. There were slight variations in all of the "fixins". Plenty of stencil brands did use similar lugs, tom arms etc. I am certainly not an MIJ Stencil expert, but I do know that I haven't personally seen two different stencil brands that were EXACTLY alike. Has anyone? If so, could you give some examples so I can gain more knowledge?

I know that not EVERY stencil brand had their own unique shells, lugs and mounts (which certainly would have been cost prohibitive), but there was enough of a variety within the Star and Pearl lines to make it interesting (i.e. there were more than just 2 kinds).

Hi Folks;

Okay, I'll weigh in... of course I have no proof, other than my good looks and diabolical skills at... oh, never mind.

Anyway, I think it was kind of like cars. Frankly, I think you're both right:

Drum Guy Dan calls a jobber and says he wants two hundred sets delivered over a period of four years. Jobber Joe says; Okay Drum Guy, how much do you want to spend on each kit?

There it is in a nutshell. The quality of the hardware varied depending on how much you spent. Maybe even the shells...

Look, these guys were NOT doing scientific tests on these shells to see how they could make them sound fabulous. As long as they were round, and the lugs didn't pull out under tension, the were happy manufacturers... My own guess is that they farmed out some of the shells to outfits all over Japan. How hard is it for a cabinet shop to make a ten foot long tube, ship the tube to Pearl or Star (Tama), and have them cut it up and turn the result into drums.

The Drum Guy didn't care, as long as he had his low end price range covered, he was good with whatever he got. The difference being how much he spent on each unit (kit) would indicate how much quality he got in the hardware.

If Drum Guy bought enough kits, he could name the new drum line after his cat, 'Sniffles'. If he didn't he got what badges they were working that week, or, on second thought, maybe it was the 'names' of those MIJ stencils that determined the quality... don't ask me, I don't know.

I do know this: When I was a kid, about ten or eleven years old, in the early sixties, my folks bought me a 'Crown' kit. Was it a Ludwig, Gretsch or Rogers? Oh no... not even close. But I sure thought it was fine n dandy at the time. It was a great kit for me to learn some rudiments on, and it even survived a Junior High Surf Band (with me as the star drummer) and what could only be called a parody of a rock band a year or so later (again with me as the star drummer).

For drums, and a kid growing up in a small California town (or any small town anywhere for that matter) those stencils were the holy grail... or at least a good cardboard copy. Compare those cheap kits from those days to the entry level kits of now a days... no comparison.

Now, fast forward to 'today'. Some of you guys are actually 'GIGGING' these relics! And, they don't sound half bad if you chose the heads with care... I know this for a rock solid fact... done it a few times.

So there you go, calfskin is right... forty years from now some folks may be out there rebuilding fly swatters and their old underwear... but a few of 'em, like it or not, may be searching this forum for 'Excel' or 'Sunlite' lugs so they can bring their old tubs back to life.

This has been a message from fishwaltz... sounds fishy to me...

Don't get me wrong: STAR had several different lugs in use during it's short life time.

But in some details there was never an equality between STAR and Pearl.

For me the hardware parts either of STAR or of Pearl are a process of elimination: Star sets NEVER had Pearl-style lugs - and vice versa. And it's the same with their tom mounts. And snare strainers.

The crux of the biscuit are some 'disturbances' by in-between companies, like Hoshino and Crown, which had details quite difficult to classify (well, I mean: at least for me).

Ralf