Okay, so I bought a painted-over, rusty, seemingly painful, and generally ugly Apollo floor tom to "sub" for a real Premier APK or Projector floor tom for my Premier mongrel kit. I had low expectations. Okay, I thought that I was going to set this damned thing on fire.
Let me preface this with the fact that I have never gotten along particularly well with my Chinese OCDP kit. I have tuned some MIC kits to sound nearly as good (if not better in some cases) as higher-priced kits. It took a head change (usually Pinstripes), but they sounded great.
Let me say that I was finding myself using Evans Hydraulic heads and Kickports in the floor tom resonant heads to make the OCDP drums sound okay. I will say that the only drum that sounded good was the kick. I will argue that a 20 X 22" kick will sound good regardless. But I just could not get along with the drums. But man- did they look Purdy!!!
This was what led me to looking for vintage kits. After all, I had the nicest set of Rogers a guy could ask for many years ago. Without going too long into the story, I will just say that they are long gone. Wish I had them back now...
I bought a Premier Gigmaker kick. While there are issues with this drum (swivel nuts missing on resonant side, as well as some hardware breakage and a slightly out-of-round resonant side), I tuned it up with just a batter and let her rip!!! She sounds FANTASTIC. Doesn't even need a pillow inside.
Premier APK tom: while it's cheap, tuned properly (and with lighter weight heads), it sounds great. I could tune it low without it sounding flabby, and this was with old heads!!!
The Apollo Orphan: What a surprise!!! Yeah, I probably overpaid ($60), but even with old heads, it sounds AMAZING. I kissed the bearing edge with some 220 grit as suggested on this forum, and BAM!!! She tuned up like nobody's business!!! I just gotta get some new heads on her.
AND guess what?!? No Evans Hydraulics needed for tuning these nicely!!!
I guess after I get some swivel nuts to replace the ones I robbed from the OCDP (in name only) kit, that thing's going on CL!!!
Jump For Joy