Set sizes... fusion, standard, something "in between"...

dkerwood

Silver Member
I own a drumset whose three toms are 10, 12, and 16 inches. Before I bought this, I also played with a drummer whose kit had the same sizes of toms.

Back when I had a 12, 13, 16" kit, I tended to overlook the 13" tom. For some reason, I could never get a good quality tone out of it. Thus, I'd often just break out the 12 and 16, playing as a 4-piece. When I found my current kit, therefore, I really liked the idea of a four piece plus one more higher tom.

Anyway, my gripe is this: Drumhead pre-packs, gig bag/cases, studio rings, head mufflers... they all seem to assume that you're either 10, 12, 14 toms or 12, 13, 16 toms... and always with a 14" snare. I'm always facing the prospect of gear for a nonexistent 13" or 14" tom. With drumheads, it's not a big deal since I use Remo Coated Ambs for almost everything- depending on what I need, I grab the 13" for my piccolo snare (and buy a separate 10" head) or grab the 14" as a main snare backup and just buy a 16" tom head.

With cases, though, that's not so easy to deal with. The pre-packs sell for quite a bit cheaper than buying ala carte, but I'd end up with an extra useless case and the need to buy yet another one. Sure, I could just get a standard and put my 10 in the 12" case, 12 in the 13" case and 16 where it belongs, but why?

Isn't 10, 12, 16 becoming more and more common? Gretsch is certainly flooding the market with the Catalina 6-piece, so at least 10, 12, 16 is easier to come by (once you realize that the 14 floor tom can't quite get the punch). So why can't retailers do something to accommodate? I used to live close to a drum store that would swap things out for me to meet my "odd" drum sizes, but I've since moved, and now I'm out of luck.

Thoughts?
 
Nothing? I know there are more people rockin' 10, 12, 16 kits out there...
 
10 12 16 is definitely becoming more popular. Pearl, Mapex, and Tama are all starting to use this configuration a lot. And yes, it annoys me (since this is my configuration as well) that no drum gear companies make packages for this config. The fact is is that 12 13 16 and 10 12 14 were the standard for years and years, and pretty much still are, and it will take companies awhile to adjust in to the changes.

What I usually end up doing for heads is buying a 10 12 14 pack of G2 coated and putting the 14 on my snare, then buying a seperate 16".
 
Put the 12 in the 13 bag, and put the 10 in the 12 bag. That is what I prefer because it is easier to put the drums in or take them out. Peace and goodwill.
 
Gator has affordable bag sets ..... in 22. 10, 12, 16, 14 and 22, 12. 13. 16, 14. Maybe these didn't exist in 2009 (?), but if so ..... the industry has caught up now.
 
My Slingerlands are 12, 13, 14. My Yamahas are 10, 12, 13, 14 and 16. And I'm a Zombie.
 
Imagine you have to work with 15” and 18” floors, 15” hats, 24” rides, and 15” snares.

View attachment 103676
My very first "real" set had 12, 13, 14, 15 rack toms and a 16" floor. That was... unwieldy. I dig your set. As long as all the right handed guys are confused by your lefty setup, might as well blow their minds with non-standard sizes, right?
 
Gator has affordable bag sets ..... in 22. 10, 12, 16, 14 and 22, 12. 13. 16, 14. Maybe these didn't exist in 2009 (?), but if so ..... the industry has caught up now.
You're exactly right. I searched high and low in 2009 for the right cases for my set and they absolutely did not exist, at least not for a newly-married, just out of college teacher whose wife was still in college. I was a little salty because just a year or two before I helped a drummer friend buy a set of Gator hard cases for his 5-piece Export for like $150. They were exactly what I needed, too - 10, 12, 16, 22, 14 snare. It was absolutely infuriating that I couldn't find what I needed without shelling out $500 for new hard cases. Even soft cases were looking like I'd need to buy two complete sets just to fit my drums.

Luckily, I was working at a high school at the time and the head band director ended up upgrading a set of cases for the drum set. I was allowed to take the old, torn, fiberboard cases out to the "trash" (he specifically told me I could just take them home since he was trashing them). Those became my cases for the next decade until I sold that kit last year. Not ideal, but I was only doing a half dozen gigs a year, tops.

Now I'm getting ready to buy a new kit, so cases will eventually need to be a thing again. 4-piece, though, so maybe a rant about why all case packages are for 5-piece? Lol.
 
My very first "real" set had 12, 13, 14, 15 rack toms and a 16" floor. That was... unwieldy. I dig your set. As long as all the right handed guys are confused by your lefty setup, might as well blow their minds with non-standard sizes, right?
😂

True.

Although I got lucky that these worked out so good, which makes them from unwieldy.

But that is also due to the depths and materials used in this kit.
 
My very first "real" set had 12, 13, 14, 15 rack toms and a 16" floor. That was... unwieldy.
My Slingerlands are a bit unwieldy. Square sized rack toms. 10x10 (not pictured), 12x12, 13x13, ..... only the floor toms and the 24x14 are "conventional". Fun drums, however.
 

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My Slingerlands are a bit unwieldy. Square sized rack toms. 10x10 (not pictured), 12x12, 13x13, ..... only the floor toms and the 24x14 are "conventional". Fun drums, however.
Mine were 80's Ludwig Rockers. I never measured, but it they WEREN'T square, they couldn't have been far off. My new kit will have a 16x14 floor. I'll be interested to see how it sounds different than the 16x16 floors I've been running for almost two decades.
 
I just ordered cases from Beato Bags for a 22-10-13-16 kit. I like that he'll do custom sizing, especially if you have rims mounts. Not cheap though by any stretch.
 
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