Wow! This is has become a pretty interesting thread! Lots of opinions and observations going this way, that way, up, down, sideways, backwards... I hope anyone reading this understands, as the last few posts demonstrate, that different people look for different sounds out of a particular drum/drum set, and that all of this is subjective and should be taken with a grain of salt.
That said, I would like to make a few comments.
I can't see much variability in the shape of a bearing edge----just that it seals and has the smallest contact area possible. It is an airseal.
Variability of the shape of the edge on the overall sound of the drum? If this is what you mean, I'm perplexed, becuase the conventional thinking (around here anyway) is much to the contrary. (Round-over edges sounding very differnent than double 45s, etc.)
There are absorptive qualities of shells.. The thing about Luan, is that it is porous and absorbs some sound, yielding a muddy coloured tone.. the bass drums tend to be boomy..
Isn't this a good thing for a bass drum? You can always control the amount of muffling, but you can't add sustain that isn't there.
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Regarding the response to my earlier comment about the MIJ shells being the same, I should clarify that comment. In the early to mid 60s, the shells coming out of Japan were the really thin 3 ply with re-rings (either 2 or 3.) These were the shells on both the Star and Pearl drums (I don't think Hoshino was in play yet.) These shells are so similar that if you took the badges and hardware off the drums, no one could tell them apart.
Later in the 60s and into the 70s, the thicker 5-? ply shells (no re-rings) came out. And again, if there were no other tell tale signs on the drum, the shells would be basically indistinguishable between Star and Pearl. I'm not the first to point this out, I'm just re-stating it here. When Star started painting the interiors grey, that was something that you could point to and say 'Star.' But, from what I've seen, the edge contours were pretty consistent from drum to drum within each drum manufacturer and between them. So much so that I have wondered if there was only 1 factory making the shells to supply both companies.
The Hoshino drums do seem to have some differences in that they were using building techiques later on that were no longer employed on Pearl and Star drums.
As to the 'grade' of luan, from what I've read, luan is a fast growing species of wood and can range widely in terms of the look of the grain. I dont think that the factory/factories really gave much thought to the piece of wood they were using - it was just the batch that they had available at the time. One possible exception to this (which I cant confirm) is that some Pearl drums seem to have a ply of maple on the interior. My thinking is that these might just have a ply of luan with a lighter color and wider grain pattern stuck on the inside because it just looked a tad bit nicer, but was really no more expensive to produce.
Finally, I also think that some of the other MIJ drum parts should get more discussion, ie; cymbals, mounting hardware, stands. I especially think that more discussion should be devoted to the lugs as I see so much variation there and they are such a vital part of the overall performance/functionality of the drum.
Sorry for the length, but there's so much to discuss!
