[SNARE TEST] Deutsh Quality, Richter ELM Snare made in Berlin

[SNARE TEST] Deutsh Quality, Richter ELM Snare made in Berlin DEMO OK

Hi guys,

Let me introduce my new Richter Elm Snare. If you do not know Richter*: this is a German Drum builder, based in Berlin. Frank Richter only makes custom drums with premium materials.

www.richterdrums.de/en/

The limit is the sky
He uses selected wood varieties and special processes to build drum sets and single drums in stave design and construction. The used woods for the shell is hand sawed from selected timber. This is what we call, here in France, «*DEUTCH QUALITY*»

The snare I requested is made of German Elm wood with a European Birch reinforcement rings. I was looking for a soft Wood, softer than Mahogany and Maple. In the Janka Wood Hardness scale, Elms is about 850 lbf. For exemple, Maple is around 1200 and Mahogany 1070 lbf.
It means that Elm tends to give very good low ends without sacrificing the Medium and high frequencie. This is an amazing tight grained tone wood, very unique and warm in terms of sound.
I wanted a 14x6 one with vintage low mass lugs and I also requested a German strainer (Sonor Dual Glide).

It took about 2 weeks of meticulous work before getting the snare (almost 24 hours of pure job). By the way, thanks to Frank Richter for this wonderful job*!

RECORDING (Soundcraft, CAD D189 mic + Eagleton electrostatic) :

Medium tuning.

No mufling

https://soundcloud.com/justdani/richter-elm-14x6-no-eq-no-muffling-medium-tunning

With mufling (Remo rings)

https://soundcloud.com/justdani/richter-elm-14x6-no-eq-muffling-medium-tunning


The Spec*:

German Elm Wood (Timber selected)
11mm Stave Handcrafted shell 14x6
European Birch Reinforcement rings
Rounded oustide and 45° inside bearing edges
Oiled hand applied satin finish
2mm deep snare beds
Low mass Vintage lugs (with removal turn of screw)
Dual glide Sonor Strainer
S Hoops USA (Safe hoops style)
Full Evans 360 G1 heads
Puresound 20 wire

Some videos of Richter Drums*:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1BXC_VKVmwU#t=4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=b5NY-MctEIk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6Kj2FW0xg4U

I just add some recordings and some new pictures :

Sounds and looks good, also matches the kit nicely.
Congrats, enjoy it!

Nicely made drum, & sits well visually with the Tambouro kit too, but I wouldn't categorise the lugs as low mass as per your description.

keep it simple said:

Nicely made drum, & sits well visually with the Tambouro kit too, but I wouldn't categorise the lugs as low mass as per your description.

Click to expand...

Thanks
Since my English is not perfect, I mean by "low mass" a light lug. Maybe I am wrong but love it anyways (I am from France)

Elm is lovely wood, but hard to find, at least here in Canada. I just found a guy whom I am making a deal for a small lot, probably enough for 5 or 6 snares I hope. The wood chips out very easily, so when routing the bearing edges, shallow multiple passes I found help. Still had a couple chunks fly out and had to repair.

I guess species vary slightly around the world, my elm looks a lot different than the German Elm. Also, maple in North America is around 1450 on the hardness scale and traditional mahogany is in the 700 range I believe.

Here is the Elm I found in a firewood pile



And it started out ugly and became pretty



I think this is the only drum I have regretted selling.

uniongoon said:

Elm is lovely wood, but hard to find, at least here in Canada. I just found a guy whom I am making a deal for a small lot, probably enough for 5 or 6 snares I hope. The wood chips out very easily, so when routing the bearing edges, shallow multiple passes I found help. Still had a couple chunks fly out and had to repair.

I guess species vary slightly around the world, my elm looks a lot different than the German Elm. Also, maple in North America is around 1450 on the hardness scale and traditional mahogany is in the 700 range I believe.

Here is the Elm I found in a firewood pile


And it started out ugly and became pretty

I think this is the only drum I have regretted selling.

Click to expand...

Hi,

I saw your beautiful snare and also got the demo from You Tube.
I love it and you made a very good job !
Sugar Maple is about 1450 indeed and the same for the hard maple.

I love the way the ELM tonewood sounds : Warm, equilibrated and so beautiful!


Yours seems to be a Rock Elm also called Cork Elm but I'm not sure at all :



Nice snare !

here an Idea of the Elm used for my snare :
Should be a "European" German Elm

quartersawn elm veneer :








There are lots of species of ELM wood but I'm pretty sure they all sound great :
Carpathian Elm, Red Elm, Siberian Elm etc

I have no idea what species Elm we have here. Could it be Dutch Elm, because the reason we don't have much Elm here is that Dutch Elm Disease swept through our country and killed them all.

Now we have something, think a beetle, going after our Ash trees. I have 8 or 9 big Ash trees on my property, all still healthy knock on wood.

uniongoon said:

I have no idea what species Elm we have here. Could it be Dutch Elm, because the reason we don't have much Elm here is that Dutch Elm Disease swept through our country and killed them all.

Now we have something, think a beetle, going after our Ash trees. I have 8 or 9 big Ash trees on my property, all still healthy knock on wood.

Click to expand...

I got confirmation from Richter, that Elm comes from Germany. So we can call it European Elm