What year do you think the photo is from?

30's - 40's??

David

I would say the 40's. This photo appeared in MD magazine and not even drum historian, Harry Cangany, could make a positive ID. He said he thought they might have been a custom-made job. Some people guessed Gretsch, but Cangany disputes that claim, too.

The interesting part is that the tuning mechanism looks somewhat remniscent of the later Arbiter "AT" design -what with the "sideways" lug, and all....but there were no Arbiter drums at that time

I have looked at this photo a few times. Do we know the player or group?

Logical deduction is that these are not US made in my opinion. Timp have been around for a very long time and used the normal tuning method.

All of the original US companies used the same tuning method.

IF these are custom made the person was a skilled craftsman in my opinion. It is possible that they are custom.

It also looks like they are all about the same size so that system on the side has to be a tuning device to change the pitch of the drums.

I guess someone could say that that it looks like a Gretsch round badge on the side of the drum, but they never made a drum like that.

So my personal opinion is German made and they are earlier then the photo.

Just a guess, and I have no specific company in mind.

If we could only pull the timp patents from the patent office.

David

The drummer is Ray McKinley.

The bass drum in the background COULD be a Slingerland (?)

You could spend hours/days in this place. Here is one single tuning device patent: D.E.Hull

Do you have any connections with the patent office?

I want to do some patent searches on specific topics and

the services charge an arm and a leg.

Thanks for the link, cool stuff and closer to maybe answering the puzzle

David

Good Ol' Ray, I should have known that, I have some other stuff with him.

Yep, I tried to zero in on the set, I wonder if there any other pictures of the group?

David

The emblem looks like a Duplex. Did'nt Duplex make alot of orchestra drums. I know they made mallets and things like that. I say Duplex.

Nope, anyone can search patents online. Here's a sample ROGERS

Very interesting stuff if your into that kind of thing. Here's the search link SEARCH