rmandelbaum
Platinum Member
I thought I would share this here for any that might be interested
I also have posted the same thread on a few other drum forums I hang out in so I apologize if this is a duplicate for you
It really just took on a life of it’s own, it has taken me 2 years of hunting to get to this point.
I know the real question is why? I never intended for it to get to this point. But before I knew it was so close I figure what the heck, I’ll go all the way now.
Here is the story,
About 2 years agoI was surfing eBay as I always do and spotted a 22x14 Superstar bass drum for $75.00. I figured at that price I would buy it and re-sell it. Later that day I spotted a 15”standard depth matching tom for $75.00 so I figured, at that price I could add another tom and have a cool vintage 4 piece kit. I found a 10” tom a few days later and contact the seller of that tom and asked if he had any more of the kit. He sent me this
I ended up making a deal so now I have basically a double basskit with power toms and one 15 standard depth.
Then I started thinking how cool it would be to have a matching set of standard toms. I would then have the option to pick and choose what I wanted to play. I found a 13” tom and grabbed it. Meanwhile I saw a 22x16 shell on eBay for next to nothing, I figured I would use the hardware off of the 22x14 and have both my kicks be deep.
Somewhere along the way I spotted the 6 &8 concert toms on a stand for $150.00
Here is where it gets really interesting. I searched high and low for a 12” standard depth tom, these are very hard to come by I would soon find. In my search I found this kit on Craigslist for 350.00.
Here is a pick after I got it home, I could not believe my eyes, it is a Rosewood snare, worth more then I paid for the entire kit!
I was short the 14" standard tom, I found one on ebay and it turned out to be a a friend from the TAMA forum so I grabbed that.
I realized at this point with the exception of a couple of bass drum hoops and some lugs I had one double bass standard depth kit and one power tom double bass kit. I found a guy selling the lugs for the bass drum and ordered a few hoops form Anderson International.
Here is a link to some close ups so you can see the main reason for the restoration
http://www.robertmdrums.com/images/tama_restoration/before/
Here they are again all stripped and ready for the next phase. I used a chemical stripper call SuperStrip, this stuff is high dangerous, it took a month of evenings to get them to this point. The Polyurethane paint is really tough stuff
Well I was a sanding fool this weekend, I originally tried a pneumatic orbital sander. I was far to aggressive and I was afraid I would end up with flat spots and other unevenness so I started sanding by hand. I got 5 drums in and realized this was a HUGE task. So I took a chance and picked up a cheap electric orbital sander. Wow it works great!
It still took a long time but it was 100 times faster and easier. I got then fairly clean. Of course where the stain was down in the pours I had to let it go, I did not want to sand through the first ply or change the OD to much. I am really please wit the results. Now I have to fix a few places where there is some minor ply separation on a few of the shells. I am going to dowel in the tom mount holes on the bass drums so they will then be virgin as well as dowel in the spur holes. the spurs on these kits did not really hold the drums from moving to well. Other then that and using RIMS to mount the toms it will look like two a brand new 80s TAMA superstar Super Mahogany kits
I also have posted the same thread on a few other drum forums I hang out in so I apologize if this is a duplicate for you
It really just took on a life of it’s own, it has taken me 2 years of hunting to get to this point.
I know the real question is why? I never intended for it to get to this point. But before I knew it was so close I figure what the heck, I’ll go all the way now.
Here is the story,
About 2 years agoI was surfing eBay as I always do and spotted a 22x14 Superstar bass drum for $75.00. I figured at that price I would buy it and re-sell it. Later that day I spotted a 15”standard depth matching tom for $75.00 so I figured, at that price I could add another tom and have a cool vintage 4 piece kit. I found a 10” tom a few days later and contact the seller of that tom and asked if he had any more of the kit. He sent me this
I ended up making a deal so now I have basically a double basskit with power toms and one 15 standard depth.
Then I started thinking how cool it would be to have a matching set of standard toms. I would then have the option to pick and choose what I wanted to play. I found a 13” tom and grabbed it. Meanwhile I saw a 22x16 shell on eBay for next to nothing, I figured I would use the hardware off of the 22x14 and have both my kicks be deep.
Somewhere along the way I spotted the 6 &8 concert toms on a stand for $150.00
Here is where it gets really interesting. I searched high and low for a 12” standard depth tom, these are very hard to come by I would soon find. In my search I found this kit on Craigslist for 350.00.
Here is a pick after I got it home, I could not believe my eyes, it is a Rosewood snare, worth more then I paid for the entire kit!
I was short the 14" standard tom, I found one on ebay and it turned out to be a a friend from the TAMA forum so I grabbed that.
I realized at this point with the exception of a couple of bass drum hoops and some lugs I had one double bass standard depth kit and one power tom double bass kit. I found a guy selling the lugs for the bass drum and ordered a few hoops form Anderson International.
Here is a link to some close ups so you can see the main reason for the restoration
http://www.robertmdrums.com/images/tama_restoration/before/
Here they are again all stripped and ready for the next phase. I used a chemical stripper call SuperStrip, this stuff is high dangerous, it took a month of evenings to get them to this point. The Polyurethane paint is really tough stuff
Well I was a sanding fool this weekend, I originally tried a pneumatic orbital sander. I was far to aggressive and I was afraid I would end up with flat spots and other unevenness so I started sanding by hand. I got 5 drums in and realized this was a HUGE task. So I took a chance and picked up a cheap electric orbital sander. Wow it works great!
It still took a long time but it was 100 times faster and easier. I got then fairly clean. Of course where the stain was down in the pours I had to let it go, I did not want to sand through the first ply or change the OD to much. I am really please wit the results. Now I have to fix a few places where there is some minor ply separation on a few of the shells. I am going to dowel in the tom mount holes on the bass drums so they will then be virgin as well as dowel in the spur holes. the spurs on these kits did not really hold the drums from moving to well. Other then that and using RIMS to mount the toms it will look like two a brand new 80s TAMA superstar Super Mahogany kits
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