Big Fat Snare Drum!

stellar92010

Senior Member
I just got this (84 or 85) Pearl 8x14 Free Floating Maple Snare Drum. the thing is CHERRY. I heard that these where really hard to tune and stuff....but....when i got it, it was tuned really high with evans heads, and had a high pitched ring that made the fillings in my teeth hurt.

threw on new remo heads, tuned it to 83 Batter/80 Reso, and zang! That was the easiest snare I've ever tuned. No exessive ring, and it has crack that will break eardrums. The thing is positively insane sounding. One thing, it has these really weird looking lugs, like hex nuts fused together.

It's going down to the studio tuesday night, I'm going to get a workout on it and have it set up--but I dont think it needs it. Now if I can find 8x14 brass and aluminum shells for it I'll be set for life.

With crack and tone like this, who needs a Reference Snare? I was going to get one but I think reference met its match (at least to my ears.)

Pics....
 

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Very nice!

I too thought of getting a matching Reference Pure snare with my Reference Pure kit and although I'm still debating about it, I think the job of the snare drum is sufficiently different from the rest of the kit that I don't think the same rules apply. Just so long as you get a pleasing snare sound you like, I think is all that matters. The principles of the Reference Pure (or any line of drums) I don't think translate to snares which would either be tuned too high or too low to really accentuate what the shell is made out of. I'm quite happy with the 6.5x14 Studio Session Classic birch/kapur snare I just got.
 
That snare IS a beast! But it is so easy to tune, I was shocked because I kept hearing horror stories about tuning floating snares.

The best thing I did for its sound was lose the Evans heads and put Renaissance Orchestral/Concert heads on it. That tamed the ring just enough so that it has a beautiful resonant overtone set and crack that a hardcore addict would die for......
 
Update on this drum--I put remo renaissance emperor batter and snare heads and we tuned it up and tried it out in studio B of Studio West in San Diego. Now, that is one of the most acoustically dead rooms I have ever been in.

My teacher put a dab of play-dough (putty) on it and then we took turns banging it for an hour. I had to put earplugs in because it was so loud.

But it is also as soft as you can touch it.

My teacher said it is a phenomenal drum, because if it can sound that good naturally in a really dead room like that then it will sound exceptional in a live environment.
 
This drum will benefit massively from fitting the special 16" wires as originally intended. Really, it's worth the effort. The modern FF doesn't have that feature. IMO, the best feature of the drum :)
 
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