Well after testing the wife's patience with my Olympic purchase, (see: http://www.vintagedrumforum.com/showthread.php?t=35328) I happened to spot a local Kijiji ad for a MIJ bass drum, and matching rack tom. I'd have resisted the urge, especially considering it was at the other side of town, however, these particular drums appeared to be a perfect match to a floor tom I'd acquired a couple of years ago. Not one of your more common wraps either, MIJ version of oyster blue pearl I would guess) and one I particularly like, (have two Ludwig kits in this wrap). Turns out, I know the vendor, and have purchased from him before. Was able to get a good price from him, so I arranged to head straight to his place after picking up the Olympics. This is a pleasant young man who is active on Kijiji here in Ottawa, buying and selling drum gear, but is not into the vintage end. While I was there, I asked him if he had any 'hex' mount hardware, (been looking for over a year now, for early 70s, Pearl double tom mount for bass drum) and he let me rummage. Low, and behold, I find two Pearl hex tom arms. Struck up a deal for these, plus a few other drum related items and I was off.

So the drums themselves are certainly nothing to get excited about - late 60s, early 70s Hoshino I believe, and what I would consider; at the lower end of the MIJ products I've handled. Cheap Luan shells with token round-over edges, and common, slot insert, shark tooth lugs. But that wrap is SWEET! Oh, but then there are those nasty Univox badges. No issue replacing them with something more aesthetic, (ah - now entering into another aspect of this query...) however, the placement of the badge on the rack tom is disturbing I find. I fear that there could be some fade difference if I remove these, nailed on badges, as there is some difference between where the cymbal, L-arm mount had been, (managed to find missing piece while I was there as well). Could swivel tom around, but diamond, slot mount makes this difficult. Oh, but check this out; as you can see from the photos, these drums are a pretty close match to the floor tom I had. It's a 16", (14'd be better) but what's the likelihood you're gonna find a match like this, especially locally. I've speculated that these may be, in fact reunited siblings, as I did purchase the floor tom locally as well. The floor tom was un-badged when I got it, but was obviously Hoshino, (really not fond of those lugs, so I swapped them for, what I believe are higher end Hoshino, spring insert lugs, (more vintage look I think) as I'd tried using it at one time as a second tom with one of my Ludwig kits. Anyway, I'm straying from my point here; on a previous purchase - in fact, I believe it was my very first purchase made with the intention of trying my hand at refurbishing kits... A bunch of orphans which I paid entirely too much for, but I've learned a lot since then. Amongst these orphans was a blue sparkle, Univox, (Hoshino) 16" floor tom. This tom is long gone, but fortuitously I'd removed the badge, and tucked it away for some possible future use - BAM!

Okay, this leads me to the question; how do I have time to write this all down, and who really cares? No, that just came to me. What my dilemma really is, is, is this: Should I restore this kit as original, with original hardware, and gaudy chrome hoops, or should I upgrade it, as I did with the floor tom, with better lugs, etc.? I think the black wood hoop, (I installed that, as it only came with the one hoop) looks sharp - the inlay is 1" wide, and I could conceivably slice it in two, and split between two wood hoops... yeah, I'm gonna do THAT!

There is also a third, more extreme option: I could pull the wrap right off the shells and apply to a nicer set of shells... dunno, sounds like a lot of work. And for what I ask you? Kick, and floor tom have low lug ratio, which is a shame, though I know that I can probably get these shells sounding pretty good. In fact the Hoshino kit that I'd sold the original Univox tom with, sounded pretty good as I recall, and I'd really done nothing to those shells.

So I'm veering towards option two - to keep shells, and upgrade the hardware. That Univox logo is just bad, and not worth reproducing as a vinyl decal in my opinion - thinking a Nice Hoshino logo. Been working on a Beatles logo - may be a good kit to apply one of those to. It should be fun, regardless. any suggestions are welcome. Thanks.