Hey Everyone!
I wanted to share my MIJ Club Date style kit. I know that Turquoise Sparkle is not an MIJ color (or even a vintage color, per se), but I saw a 70's Premier kit once in this finish on ebay and I loved how cool it looked. Here's the skinny on these:
I originally got this kit for less than $100 on ebay (no snare). 12/16/20/14 Snare. They were originally red sparkle, and the floor tom was a dual lug drum (not single). That seems to be the case on many of these MIJ's: the floor tom is either not included, or it's a double lug drum matched with the other single lug drums. I already had a red sparkle kit, and I thought that since these would good re-wrap candidates, that I would convert the floor tom to a club date style.
The bass drum is all original, except for the resonant side hoop (it was missing). The reso hoop is wood, the batter hoop is plastic. I also replaced the original cymbal mount with a Ludwig bracket and L-arm, and filled in the original with wood filler prior to re-wrap (it looked like an elongated tear drop that took a skinny rod and only adjusted up and down). As I have stated before on this forum, I don't trust any cymbal holder without an eyebolt. It has no re-rings and has gray painted interior.
The rack tom is all original. It has 2.3mm hoops. It has natural interior with no re-rings, but it seemed a little flimsy to me, so I gave the inside and outside of the shell a few coats of polyurethane prior to the re-wrap, and then really helped the shell stiffen up quite a bit.
The floor tom had some water damage on the outside (ply separation) and some water stains on the inside (doesn't it seem like most MIJ's have some sort of water staining and/or damage on the floor toms and/or bass drum)? I filled in all the existing lug holes with wood filler and I repaired the minor ply separation with wood filler as well. The shell itself is 3-py with re-rings. I polyurethaned the inside and outside of the shell, to give it strength and to stiffen the wood filler. I found a cheap, 8 lug snare on ebay that matched the rack tom lugs and used those for the lugs, and I used Ludwig brackets. The only original part of the floor tom are the straight legs. It also has 2.3mm hoops.
The snare was left over from another MIJ kit that I parted out. I took off the original wrap and wrapped it to match this kit. As is on virtually all MIJ snares, the strainer was unusable, so I replaced it with a Ludwig P-85. Only the lugs are original. It too has 2.3mm hoops.
I think they came out great, and I did all the work myself. They are super fun to play! Let me know what you guys think.
Thanks,
V
