First, welcome back to the forum...

As a general rule in vintage drums, serial numbers do not mean much at all... They do not tell you much about the drums..

Your set is from the 80's, so most would not call them vintage.

I usually start from the 70's back for vintage.. Anything over 30 years to me...

Your drums are still newer. This is all personal terminology and everyone is different. We do know that usually anything over 100 years old is considered a true antique...

So, your set will not have a vintage value placed on them and will not have appreciated like sets that are older..

There was a longer discussion on this topic and a few other people did have their own opinion and that is what forums are all about.

So, your drums to me like any 80's drums are collectible and nice kits as well, but not vintage yet!

David

Thanks for the straightforward answer. I will reference my 69 Ludwigs as I continue to enjoy this forum and consider the anniversary set as collectable for my son to enjoy at a later date. As the restoration goes forward on the newer set I'll apply the same methods to them as I would consider for Vintage drums. Although there does seem to be somewhat of a "knowledge,hardware & NOS parts gap" from the 80s era for ludwig drums. TMTM

I consider it drums of 30+ years of age that are desirable. So that means pretty much anything from the 60s and before, and a few cases here and there in the 70s.

Vintage is the opinion of--- everyone? Sounds like something just floating around out there without any definite qualities. Just something to ponder. TMTM

Different types of collections have different types of criteria for such terms.

"Vintage" pertaining to drums probably has more to do with their rareness or with their collectible factor.

For what I collect (in terms of drums), I usually consider anything from 1975 or prior as "vintage" because that's when Ludwig began to change their ways and everything they produced subsequent to that incorporated different manufacturing methods and materials, which I feel compromised their quality. So, for me, the "good stuff" is 1975 or earlier. That's when American manufacturing was really American manufacturing. Those days are gone.

I think "antique" is a term that has to do more with a specific age. I have heard it said that anything older than 100 years is an antique. Burger Kin

Correct, the terms "Vintage", "Rare", and "Mint" mean a lot of different things to people... When you get all three in a title on Ebay, you know your in for trouble...

David

Hey! I feel the same as all you"al and do understand the specifics of vintage and collectible. My personal opinion is (with a few exceptions)the 30 year cutoff. I agree with you o-lugs, there is a very siginificant difference between my obp 69 lugwigs and the 1984 anniversary set of my son,s. The ludwig company was going thru a time that took a while to relearn its (old ways).

But after saying that, the new set DOES have its own newer sound and they do sound pretty good. My son said they gave him his own sound and I agreed. Its a generational thing. Nothing to do with value. TMTM