where to find wood for stave shells?

If you want to assemble pre-cut staves, joshua tree percussion and vaughncraft will sell you shells. I believe they cut thier own wood from lumber.
 
If you want to assemble pre-cut staves, joshua tree percussion and vaughncraft will sell you shells. I believe they cut thier own wood from lumber.

nah, i like to do it all myself. most likely, were gonna just make it out of standard maple, but if i can find some birdseye for a decent price id like to go with that.

im wanting to make quite a few shells.
4 x 14 snare
8 x 12 tom
13 x 14 floor
15 x 16 floor
15 x 18 kick
14 x 26 kick

with these i could do many setups.

bop -
14 12 14 18

stanton -
14 12 14 18 side26

bonham -
14 12 14 16 26
 
I'm pretty sure you need a lathe to make stave shells. I could be wrong though.
 
Go to a lumber yard, anywhere that sell seasoned woods will have a variety - dont just restrict yoursel fot maple, great thing about staves is that you cna mix it up a bit.

I suggest checking out ghostnote.net before you start a build fresh faced, get some info from the pros, there is also programs on the internet that will calculate the stave cut angle to get acertain diameter shell.

Goodluck! Hope it works!
 
you dont. it just takes longer and is harder without one. with that said, my dad is a carpenter by trade, and may either have a lathe or have access to one.

If he's a carpenter, ask him he surely know where to get wood, and 26" stave I gotta see this, and even more see the lathe that will do it.
 
If he's a carpenter, ask him he surely know where to get wood, and 26" stave I gotta see this, and even more see the lathe that will do it.

yea the thought of a 26 being impossible has definitely crossed my mind. but why not try?

oh frank, what kind of joint do you use between the staves? is it a flat butt joint or do you dovetail it at all?
 
yea the thought of a 26 being impossible has definitely crossed my mind. but why not try?

oh frank, what kind of joint do you use between the staves? is it a flat butt joint or do you dovetail it at all?

I think it's im possibe to do dove tails. It's just a butt joint using glue and strap clamps.
 
what will the drums sound like if the inside of the shell is left unrounded?
i was researching more on how to do this without a lathe, and came across someone who only rounds the outside of his shells.
he says that the sharper angles give him a little more projection but, other than that, dont change the sound.

frank, what do you think?
 
nah, i like to do it all myself. most likely, were gonna just make it out of standard maple, but if i can find some birdseye for a decent price id like to go with that.

im wanting to make quite a few shells.
4 x 14 snare
8 x 12 tom
13 x 14 floor
15 x 16 floor
15 x 18 kick
14 x 26 kick

with these i could do many setups.

bop -
14 12 14 18

stanton -
14 12 14 18 side26

bonham -
14 12 14 16 26
Ambitious project, but I think you need some pretty specialized equipment and some training.
 
hey dmc, ill never get anything done with that attitude. haha
no, i know its not going to be easy, but ive done alot of woodworking myself, and my dad has been a carpenter for 25 years.

i honesty dont think it will be that difficult, just alot of work...
 
but does anyone know what sound differences are associated with leaving the inside of the shell untouched?

It couldn't hurt to try and it would be a learning experience and fun. People have been making stave drums for hundreds of years, without modern tools, so it why not give it a try.

Drums have so many staves that they are close to being round even unlathed, so I don't think an unlathed stave drum interior is going to sound much different than a lathed interior, but I could be wrong. The texture of the wood and any finishes are going to have a much bigger impact.
 
It couldn't hurt to try and it would be a learning experience and fun. People have been making stave drums for hundreds of years, without modern tools, so it why not give it a try.

Drums have so many staves that they are close to being round even unlathed, so I don't think an unlathed stave drum interior is going to sound much different than a lathed interior, but I could be wrong. The texture of the wood and any finishes are going to have a much bigger impact.

so, in this past few weeks i have done alot of web surfing looking at different stave companies and different forums discussing the homemaking of these drums. i am very intrigued and excited to get started. earlier, i found bredeson drums and they appear to not turn the inside of the shell.

ive looked around for the math behind the cutting of staves and havent found much. does anyone have the formula for cutting staves? what more would it need to take into consideration other than shell diameter and thickness, and stave count and width?

ideally, i would like the staves of all of the drums to be the same width to preserve a consistant look over the whole kit. is this possible?
 
first, you gotta find the circumference of the shell, which is pi times diameter. so for a 14 inch shell you multiply 14 by 3.14 and you get 44 inches. Divide that number by the number of staves ( usually twice the number of lugs). SO, for a 14" drum with 8 lugs, you have 16 staves at 2 3/4" wide. To get the bevel angle for the staves just divide 360 by twice the number of staves (because each stave has two sides). So if you have a drum with 16 staves, you need to put an 11.25 degree angle on each side of the stave. You can buy chamfer bits for the router with the angle you need, which makes things a lot easier, because if the angle is off by even a little bit the joints won't close and you will have a very weak shell.

if you're not going to round the inside of the shell, I would mill the staves on the thin side, around 5/8" thick. You have to at least round the top inch or so with a router so that you have a smooth surface for the router bit to ride on when you cut your bearing edges, otherwise the edges aren't going to come out right and the drum is going to sound like crap- perfect bearing edges are key.


good luck!
 
...oh, and don't buy expensive lumber, because you're going to need a lot of it to make all those shells, and chances are you're going to make a lot of firewood too.
 
hey dmc, ill never get anything done with that attitude. haha
no, i know its not going to be easy, but ive done alot of woodworking myself, and my dad has been a carpenter for 25 years.

i honesty dont think it will be that difficult, just alot of work...

DMC is right, it's not a question of attitude, it's a question of knowledge of tooling and be well equiped. Why don't you just start by a snare shell, see how it goes and build from that.

The companies that do not lathe the inside of their shell, is only because they are not capable of doing so, not only it look really amateur, but it had a lot of weight to the shell, and have no benefit at all on the overall sound, it just put the shell pitch higher wich is not the best caracteristique for a stave shell. Please don't take this in the bad way, it's only advises I'm giving you.
 
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The companies that do not lathe the inside of their shell, is only because they are not capable of doing so, [...]

Or maybe because at the end of the day that it is not that important!

[...] not only it look really amateur, but it had a lot of weight to the shell, and have no benefit at all on the overall sound, it just put the shell pitch higher wich is not the best caracteristique for a stave shell

Do you find this "amateur"? Tamburo Original have unlathed interior, but have an incredible tuning range, are thinner and have more body than most other (stave) shells I have seen and heard.
 

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