kelly's last post is bringing back reccessed memories,when I was a kid I had a snare drum,but some of my neighbors had nice drum kits and would let me play,one kit had a strainer where the throwoff lever came above the rim,and you could disengage re engage the snares with a flick of the stick.With the shell I have I am going for a 1940's ford woody kind of look,plus I mostly play blues and am in a variety band where I need to change from snare to timbale sound quickly,so after seeing your drum with the wood finish,I know mine would look great too,so I would get the the look and functionality all in one.The weird thing is that the drum I played with the classic strainer was on a black vistalite snare with a vistalite nine peice kit.The snare had no extra holes that I could see,so it either was original,or the hole spacing could be the same as a p-85 maybe?or another ludwig throw?Plus would a classic strainer work on a 5 1/4 depth shell?

oops,just looked at first post guess it would work with a 5 1/4 shellDOH

Yep, no problem at all. This particular shell is actually 5". As I recall, the Buddy Rich Ludwig Super Classic with the P-87 was a 5.5" shell.

Have fun with it!

-kellyj