I'm coming to this late, but find this an interesting topic. Refinish, repair, restore, preserve; they're all relevant but the choice seems to be highly dependent on the article at hand. It seems there are no hard and fast rules.

As in the original post, most anything with verifiable history attached to it is usually worth more in original condition, with the apparent exception of cars and possibly artwork by known masters, in which restoration is not only acceptable but desirable. A '50s vintage Ferrari race car that is totally trashed but driven by Surtees is restoration fodder and of little interest in its current condition.

The comments on refinishing, restoration and preservation all make sense, but the choice is often difficult.

A vintage Martin guitar will almost always lose value if you do ANYTHING to it even though it was owned by your next door neighbor since 1935 and never left the house (no public history). This seems to be primarily because the sound of the instrument is so highly valued that doing anything other than fixing structural problems risks altering that sound if only in subtle ways. Making cosmetic changes or refinishing is nearly always a bad idea from a valuation perspective, unless it is to undo modern cosmetic changes, e.g. changing the pick guard.

Drums seem to be less sensitive to this. You can replace all of the rusted hardware on a shell without altering the sound in any detectable way, so that criteria doesn't really work. The heads are consumable just like guitar strings or tires on a car. Whether you make cosmetic changes to a drum or not seems a personal aesthetic choice if you are planning to play it.

I currently have a 1950 or so Ludwig classic set that has some rust on the hardware but nothing that can't be refinished. The questions are: replate all the hardware? Replate only the badly rusted ones? Remove the rust and leave it in its original condition? Replace the rusted hardware with more modern but matching parts? To me the questions have to be answered by economics and how I want the set to look.

If I intend to play it and care primarily about the sound, then it doesn't really matter which path I take and the cosmetics need only be "good enough for me." If I'm going to sell it, I probably would do nothing to it and leave that up to the buyer. If it is for my collection, then restoration to the greatest extent possible is probably the right choice. On this set, I'm inclined towards eliminating issues like rust but not removing signs of aging or altering the originality any more than needed.

There are no easy answers.

Jim

[COLOR="DarkRed"]Nor do your questions have easy answers. Funny this thread has been resurrected, because a few days ago I stumbled across a post on another Forum about Rogers internal hardware (i.e. screws and washers and plates, fer' goodness sake !)

Believe it or not...folks there were sayin' that it is not GOOD for the value of the kit to remove the patina and even the white sorta chalky stuff which often builds up on those things, inside the shell.

I found that extreme....again...is someone saying that removing the ORIGINAL STOCK screws and washers to give 'em a bath and get rid of the chalky stuff...then re-installing the very same....actually somehow puts the authenticity of the kit into question ??? And decreases it's value ?

That IS what was being said. Apparently there are those who believe it does. Whether this is a vintage drum "industry standard" or not...I dunno.

IMHO...there is a point when things get taken a bit too far...and this is one example. Another being...replacing a set of washers from a certain old kit with the same set of washers from the same brand of kit of the same time period....is verboten.

These things seem crazy to me.

So....it could be...in some vintage circles...someone might tell you NOT to touch that hardware unless they are downright rusting....[/COLOR]

This is why I followed this forum's advice on NOT becoming a collector and to just stay a player. This stuff would drive me insane! I want a kit that plays well and that stays functional. I also want it to look like I want it to look. Wow. You guys nailed me right. I seriously couldn't be a collector if all of this is involved. Thank you again.

I put away my old slingy kit and have been playing my new little gretsch kit. So I am thinking about detailing my slingerlands, but what do I do with them when I am done? Take pictures and put them back into the cases? What do you guy's do with all your collectables?

To CarstenM

Wise words, man! Clapping Happy2 Ludwig 60-70 for ever!!

[COLOR="DarkRed"]I missed that comment...yes, I agree...nice one !

Basically, all I try to do if I get a vintage kit with some hardware or conditions which need replacing...is replace those elements with the same sorta elements from that mfr. and from the same era. If the rail on a Keystone Ludwig Clubdate is trashed...I will get a Ludwig rail from the Keystone era on eBay. if a Slingerland bass drum has lost it's cymbal mount...I will hunt down another Slingy cymbal mount from that era.

If a Rogers kit has overly-pitted Beavertail lugs...I will replace them with nicer Beavertail lugs from that time period, give or take a few years.

I stop at doing things like HAVING to get a Rogers wood bass drum hoop for a Rogers kit which is missing a hoop. Measure the width of the inlay....then find a wood hoop with an inlay groove rabbeted of the same width, or within 1/8" of the same width. Then install matching wrap inlay. Slap the hoop on the bass drum. Looks awesome....End of story.

For me, that is going the whole 9 yards. Beyond this...things like what I illustrated above... just get too extreme for me to even worry about....[/COLOR]