Re: THE TOM TUNING THREAD
Say, since this is the "Tom Tuning Thread", I thought I'd go ahead and post this in here.
It's been posted over at the "Snare Tuning" thread for a couple of years now, but I feel it applies here as well.
Here's my step-by-step tutorial on how to change out and tune up a drum head.
It's kinda long, so get comfy.
Read it all first, THEN do it (refer back, if you need to).
There's a few ways to "break in" a new head.
Over the years, I've tried various methods.
The way I'm about to describe has worked very well for me and is a much faster way of "breaking in" a head than most others:
1) Remove the old head.
2) Take a piece of cloth (old T-shirt works well) and give a quick wipe to the bearing edge, the underside of the collar and the glue ring of the new head and the underside of the hoop.
3) Place the new head on the drum and spin it on the shell.
Make sure it fits on and spins easily.
If not, return the head and get another.
If it does, continue...
4) Place the hoop in the head, insert the tension rods, tighten all rods finger tight (I like to use both hands, turning the 2 rods that are on the exact opposite sides of each other at the same time).
5) Take your tuning key and start applying tension to the head by turning the tension rods.
Use a STAR PATTERN to tension the head, so that it torques down evenly.
If you're drum is a 6 lug drum, look at the end of the drum you're working on and situate the lugs so that you have one lug looking right at you and the one opposite is looking straight away from you.
If you play "connect the dots" with the other 4 lugs, it should make a "box" shape.
6) Now imagine the face of a clock superimposed over the drum, with the number 12 being the lug looking away from you and the number 6 being the lug looking straight at you.
The rest of the numbers on the imaginary clock will be fairly close to the following lug positions;
The lug in the upper right hand side will be "2", the lug in the lower right hand side will be "4", the lug on the lower left hand side will be "8" and the lug on the upper left hand side will be "10".
7) Tighten the head down in 2 steps, or "patterns".
The first one will be:
12,6,2,8,4,10.
The second one will be:
6,12,4,10,2,8.
Repeat these patterns, in the order I just laid out, placing one complete 360 degree revolution on each rod (which I call "a turn") the first time around, then use 180 degree revolutions (which I call a "1/2 turn") there after, until you've put 3 turns on each of the tension rods.
8) At this point, the head is evenly tensioned and fairly taught.
You may have heard some cracking or "popping" at this point, and that's fine.
Place the drum on the floor with the head you're working on looking up.
Now, place the heel of one of your hands in the center of the head and give one very hard, sharp, quick push.
DON'T BE A WIMP HERE! PUT YOUR WEIGHT INTO IT!
You may have heard more cracking at this point or you may not hear more cracking at this point.
Either is fine.
9) Now pick the drum off the floor and place it on a soft surface with the end you're working on looking up.
That old T-shirt (folded) you used to wipe the drum off with in the beginning would work fine.
If your bed has a comforter on it, that would be perfect.
The soft surface will completely muffle the other head so that you only hear the head you are tuning, which brings us to...
10) Remove all of the tension from the head you're working on.
Use the star patterns I laid out in step #7, until you feel the tension on the rods get pretty slack.
By that time, you probably won't need to use the key anymore.
Keep loosening the tension until the rods are no longer tensioning the head (look for an obvious gap between the head of the rod and the hoop).
11) Start tightening down on the head again with the rods, using the star patterns I showed in step #7.
This time, you will tension the head to whatever setting gives you the sound you're looking for.
Once you start to feel a little tension on the head, start tapping it in the middle after completing each star pattern, to see if the head is tensioned where you want it.
12) Once you reach that point, stop tightening and tap on the head at each point that corressponds with a tension rod, about 1/4" in from the edge.
You can use a stick or your finger, it really doesn't matter.
13) Tap each point once and listen to the drum.
14) If you hear a nice, even sound that is the same pitch at all the points, you're finished tuning this head and you may skip to step # 21.
That head is now tuned to where you want it to be and it should hold that tuning for as long as you want it to.
15) If you hear a "wobbly" or "uneven" sound coming from some of those points, then the head is not tensioned evenly.
The sound you're hearing is known as distortion and is caused by the head creating several dissonant frequencies at once, due to the fact that it's seeing different tension in different spots of the head.
Dissonant frequencies are ones that do not harmonize with each other, thus resulting in the distorted sound you hear.
16) At this point, you'll need to "fine tune" the head.
17) Check around the head and see if that distorted sound isn't more prevelent at certain points more than others.
If so, try correcting those first.
18) Correct by tightening that tension rod, slightly.
Tap on the head once, at that tension rod, and tighten the rod as the sound decays.
You shouldn't have to turn the rod more than 1/4 of turn at a time.
If you do, then stop and tap the head at the rod that is on the exact opposite side of the drum and see if you don't hear the distorted sound coming from that one.
If so, do the same thing until the sound "evens out".
19) Tap around the head again and see if the distortion is still heard.
20) If so, do the same procedure at each of those rods as well.
21) Once you have everything sounding nice and "even", pick the drum up and hold it in your hand BY THE TOM BRACKET. NEVER HOLD IT BY THE RIM.
The combination of the weight of the drum, your grip and the thickness of the hoop may be enough to throw the head "out of tune" at this point, if the drum is held by its rim.
22) Hit the middle of the drum while holding it up.
23) If it sounds "good", you're done.
If you still get that distortion, set the drum back down on the soft surface it was on and tap around the head again to see if you didn't miss anything.
24) If it sounds good, flip the drum over and tap around the edge of the other head.
Chances are it may have been out of tune and you didn't realize it until now.
25) If the distortion is heard with either head, correct those problems and perform step #22 again.
26) If you STILL get that distorted sound go back and perform steps 23-25 and check the heads again.
If everything sounds good on it's own, then your heads are "out of phase" with each other (i.e., each head is tuned to a frequency that is dissonant to the other).
At this point, you'll have to pick one of those heads and retune it to a different pitch that will put the heads back "into phase".
Remember, the batter head sets the tone of the drum, the resonant head sets the amount of resonance of the drum.
The change will most likely not have to be that drastic and the sound of your drum may not change all that much.
27) Make the correction, perform step # 22 and see how the drum sounds.
...If everything sounds good, NOW you're done!
Chances are very good that you will NOT have to perform all 27 steps.
I just wanted to cover some basic problems you might encounter while trying to tune up the drum.
One of the most important points in tuning a drum, that most drummers overlook, is the "cracking" procedure.
You MUST find a way to form that head to the bearing edge, and stress the glue that may be holding the head material to the glue ring, or else you will stand a very good chance of encountering (unneccessary) problems with getting the head tuned up.
You can crank up the tension and leave it sit for a week, or use a hair dryer on it, or simply push down on the center of the head (like I do!).
Any of these procedures will form the head to the bearing edge (leaving it sit for a week works the worst, trust me on this one!).
Hope you found this helpful.
Elvis