Hey Lucky you ever looked at the Remo Suede Powerstroke 3... integrated ring. I picked one up to give it a try in my Rogers 20"... Columbus Pro Percussion said they were great... of course they were selling it to me. ;)

Might be worth a look... they do make it in an 18".

Just tossing the idea out.

I use felts on my bass drums. On my 18's, I use coated Ambassadors or Emperors. With the Ambassador, I like the felt off-center to my right and running vertically. I may or may not use one on the front head, too.

Don't know what these are (heads), I think they might be Evans, that is what is on the rest of the kit. The bass drum front is coated, batter clear, both have some kind of plastic ring at the rim. Do they even need a felt strip? Maybe I'll pick up an Ambassador or Emperor. Emperor's are 2 ply correct? Never tried the suede. How do they sound?

Since the head you are describing sounds like it comes with the built in tone ring I doubt if you will need a full felt strip on the batter head. I have had much success with buying self-adhesive felt foot pads that you can get at any pharmacy. They come in squares of about 4"x4". I get them at CVS with 3 pads in a pack for about $3.00. I place one where the beater will hit it...then add as needed from there. It eliminates most of the ring, but allows for enough resonance to give the drum a good solid bass sound.

I am not sure if I like the sound of those plastic rings, they just sound sort of, well, plastic. I am looking for something warmer, but I still want that low end. I never used an emperor on a bass drum. Would the felt pad and felt strip be overkill, too dead?

No, I don't think it would be overkill and one of the nice things about the "footpad" idea is you can do it one pad at a time AND you can place it on the outside of the head...a very easy, quick way to do it.

I understand your concern about the "plastic" sound, but I think you would be happy with the tone you will get...especially with the Evans heads.

Another option you might want to consider, is that of an external muffler that clips onto the bass drum hoop. Many vintage kits used them and they work very well.

Here is a link to my Ludwig Junior kit. http://www.vintagedrumforum.com/showthread.php?t=3993

The second picture shows the type of muffler I am talking about. I have seen them for sale on EBay -sometimes quite pricey...but they do work and are completely adjustible externally.

It is true that the felt strips are more problematic to work with and adjust, but I do feel they allow a thinner head to be used and give a the best bass drum sound and feel.

When I use an Emperor (as opposed to an Ambassador) as a batter head, I don't use felt on it, but I do always use a felt on the front head (usually a 10 mil. logo head -a la an Ambassador). If I do felt both heads, it's usually when I have Ambassadors on both batter and resonant sides. Some drums I own I like to tune higher and the felt takes some of the "boink" out of the sound. It's all very subjective.

The "convenience" that some of these pre-muffled heads offer to some people, end up being limiting to me. I have come to the conclusion that the old standard-issue coated heads are still what works the best -both in terms of sound and practicality

My $0.02 on this... I've used felt strips, the Remo Muff'l Ring, etc... and they all have their pros/cons. I used to use a pillow in the kick too, but I'm older and wiser now.

I was using felts on my stencil kit's kick and the sound was pretty open, with just enough muffling to keep it under control. The batter head was a pinstripe and the reso was a coated ambassador. Pretty good sound, but I swapped the batter head for a Remo Powerstroke III and tried the Remo Muff'l Ring on it and WOW, much better sound.

I had been told by several other drummers that the Aquarian SuperKick and Regulator heads were "Da Bomb", but was reluctant to spend the money on them (about $70.00 for the batter and reso). I lucked out and purchase a cheapo stencil kit which had a 22" kick and the above mentioned heads. Even on a really low quality luan kick, they sounded amazing.

I've since equipped all of my kits with the Aquarian combo and I'm pleased as punch with the sound. If you want the rock thud, tune them low, if you want more ring and a rounder sound, tune them up. I have one on my recently restored Kent 20" kick, batter tuned to a medium low tension, reso tuned up higher, and it just sounds great. Punchy, but with gobs of tone.

I've heard some drummers remark that the Superkick heads make all kicks sound the same, but it's just not true. I have one on my 22" modern no-name import kick (45 degree bearing edges) which I used in a recent recording session. The producer stated that he had never heard so much low end from a kick before.

Maybe not the best choice for jazz (that remains to be seen) - If you're playing rock, blues, country or whatever, I think the Superkick and Regulator can't be beat.

I plan on testing one of my kicks with a Superkick on the batter side and a Remo coated Ambassador on the reso side. May have to use felt, or some other type of stuff to tone it down a bit, but I do love the look of a pristine white Remo (sans mic port) on the front of the kick. So classic.

Thanks to ReGal for the tip on those felt pads - I never would have thunk to look at CVS for drum accessories :)

Thanks to all, great info! I think I will start with the felt pads and go from there. I guess I really don't know what to expect, this is my first 18" kick. It has a pretty wide tuning range, a lot deeper than I expected. For years I played a 20" slingerland with a pinstripe and dead ringer foam ring that had the adhesive on it. Always sounded great, there are just too many choices out there right now to choose from. I kind of gravitated to Evans a few years ago, getting away from Remo. I will post after my experiments.