Hi Everyone,
After reading through every page of this Sonor porn, which never fails to amaze me with the beauty and quality of all the various kinds of Sonor drums--new & vintage--I'd like to share pictures of my two kits because I don't think I saw either of these finishes in all those pages of porn.
My first kit is a Force 3005 in Black Sparkle lacquer. I have no idea why Sonor discontinued this finish with the 3007's. To me, it's more dynamic and dazzling under lights compared to Piano Black. One thing I don't like about the 3005's is their puffy-sticker badges, though. IMO, it cheapens the look of the drums. I removed the stickers with a heat gun; now there's even more of that deep, glossy lacquer finish to admire! I added an 8" tom to the Fusion-sized kit. This finish is difficult to photograph well.
I wasn't expecting to buy a second kit, as the all-maple 3005's are pretty much at the top end of the intermediate spectrum, but one day while wasting some free time searching through MusicGoRound's site, I stumbled upon this ad; I thought it had to be a mistake! A 5-piece Sonor Delite kit including matching snare, Fusion sizes, for $1499.99?? I agonized that entire weekend about whether or not to buy them as I wasn't really in the market for a second kit, but needless to say, the credit card won that battle the following Monday morning.
The Delites arrived in mint condition except for a few tiny chips in the front bass hoop and some scuffing on the virgin bass drum. The scuffs fortunately weren't deep and I was able to buff them out of the clearcoat. The previous owner had installed Pinstripes, so my guess is he didn't like open-toned resonant drums...maybe that's why he got rid of them. I put Clear Amb's and Vintage A's on the toms and the snare already had a Coated Amb. I'm still using because it sounds
that good.
A Delite kit with a matching snare is already quite rare, but this snare is even more rare due to the 14x6" size. It's easily the most amazing part of the kit...so subtle, dynamic, loud when needed, and when I did some cross-sticking, it was incredible...it made "that sound" that you only hear on mic'd, recorded drums...right out of the box, with nothing but a tune on the original heads. That really started my lust over Sonor! Although it took me a few years, I was able to track down matching 8x8" and 16x16" toms, so the final kit specs are 8/10/12/14/16" toms, 22" bass and 14x6" snare.
The finish is Metallic Marine lacquer, which was also discontinued when Sonor updated to the round-badge Delites. I've tried researching this but I can only make an educated guess that this was a very unpopular finish for the square-badge Delites. I wasn't able to get production numbers out of Sonor, but it appears only 2 finishes were discontinued with the square badge line, Green Fade & Metallic Marine...so I imagine those would be the rarest Delite finishes.
Metallic Marine might not have been very popular, but I love it. It looks either indigo or royal blue with glints of purple under lights. This pic of the bass drum is a pretty accurate shot of how they look under good lighting.
I don't really lust after much, now that I have the Delites...but those of you with 5-Star kits and the gold hardware/Ebony Makassar veneer, that's one of my dream kits. The other would probably be a set of Mapex Orions in Limited Edition Ocean Wave Burl finish. I realize I'll probably never own either--but I can live with that.
Thanks for the opportunity to share my Sonor kits!