I`m sticking with splay issue but he`s not showing the fully assembled tom in question.

From the footprint of the casting to the center of the hole matters when the hoop comes into play.

Good morning, chaps. Today I am attaching two pics showing the assembled rods, lugs & heads on the hanging tom (for Oddball). Please note that the head is not tightened down as I've had these drums dismantled since the beginning of this conversation, and am keeping them all loose till I get conclusion, so to speak.

I have not disassembled the bass drum yet. But I found that I have a picture of the inside of the BD, which does go some way to point up a couple of things. You can see that the bass drum has the same screw head on the lugs as the hanging tom, meaning the floor tom is the odd one out in my kit. And then ... you can see that the BD is dated Nov 62 ... same as the hanging tom. Whereas the floor tom is dated Dec with the year being obscure. Could this answer the question re: the different screws??

Bass drum attachments are failing upload. Back soon!

Now it's only letting me attach one at a time! Here's the first:-

Here's the second. No difference really. As you can see BD has same date and same screw heads as hanging tom.

I figured I may as well throw in for good measure a pic of my Artist snare, which is a 1965, and has the same lug screws as the 1962 tom!

Confooooosing !

You need the drum assembled to judge the splay of the rods. It almost looks like it was nested inside another tom without bottom lugs, with weight on it. But you would know that happened. The rods don`t have the kind of tool markings on them to be over tightened super tight, You would know that`s happening too because your key or tool will be really hard to turn.

The only Facts we have is that you absolutely have two different lugs.

The lugs are pushed up and in at the top, and the bottom inside mounting screw pushed inward.

So excessive force was applied, maybe not all at once but I don`t see the owner not realizing that.

The first and second pics are the same pic. I do that with this uploader a lot too.

Slingerland will buy those screws by the pound and will have bins of them so screws selection can be the same for the entire run of the series and if they use the same lug, it can go for years and years. A new order may have a more optional, improved screw head.

Gonna have to put our thinking caps on and maybe combine them to solve this.

Everything points to over tightening, power tool or by hand. since the hoop don't touch the shell, is the head, (calf or plastic) strong enough to hold under that kind of torque ?

We need the Slingy guys to confirm that both of those lugs are Slingy but of different production years or not.

Then why they show up on the same kit.

A splay issue will give you reason to go really tight to stop hoop slide, when tightening each rod separately it will pull one side to the other then back again and so on till it`s tight enough to stop sliding. That`s my original theory.