What an incredibly cool idea. I love this. I followed the "wood" thread and started gettin' the itch. Nicely played.

The Gretsch shells were maple with walnut colored dark stain, Ithink.

Here's the walnut paper-backed veneer. $50 for the sheet! It was an older lot the owner wanted to clear out. It has two booked matched sections. I wet one corner to show the effect the tung oil finish will have. I hope to get started after Easter. Kiss

~K

[COLOR="DarkRed"]Wow...Walnut. I like Walnut...nice closed grain, very velvety looking. I think tung oil will be a great finish on that stuff ![/COLOR]

Finally got the badges on the rack tom.

The hardest thing was finding the silver round head tacks, cutting them off and attaching to the shell.

I found the missing 16" sonor hoop on eflay and its in the mail. When it arrives I'll attach the badges to the floor tom and send a final, "DONE" photo... ;)

~K

Very very cool looking kit... nice job!!

Can't believe the tone of bass...very deep and boomy for such a thin shell.

I'm lovin' itWalking

Those look fabulous! Where did you finally find the tacks? I put a sonor champion rim on the bottom of my floor tom. It wasnt excatly like the top one, but acomidated the large sonor slotted tension rods. What kind of heads did you use? I put the vintage remo's on mine. There is a sonor snare stand and hi hat on ebay as we speak. from the same era. Those look sweeeeet

Party

The tacks were found at a hardware store. Very rare though, I checked seven stores before finding them.

I used original Sonor heads which are still in good shape.:

1) Bass- Evans' early 60's model "All Weather" resonant head with original Sonor logo. These were produced at the same time that calf heads were being phased out; hence the term "All Weather" indicating that they won't stretch under humid conditions. Batter head is a Remo Powerstroke 3.

2) Rack tom-Original Sonor 2 ply head. Killer retro sound with this!!! Remo clear ambassador on the bottom

3) Floor tom-Ambassador coated batter (for a vintage sound), same on bottom.

I like your suggestion Poppy of Vintage Remo's and will giev them a try.

~K

The sonor hi hat stand is going for cheap and has a few hours to go bette snatch it up!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=200329704450

snare stand and cymbal stand.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=170320769856

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=270374512171