restoring a '65 Ludwig kit...

[flapmaggot]

This is a shot, but, pro drum shop in L.A. can get anything. I had a 63 ludwig that needed a couple of lugs, screws a BD hoop as well as a black diamond inlay for the BD hoop. Stan nailed it, and had everything. Not cheap but if you need a real part, they are the cats.

Pro Drum in Hollywood located on Vine. Maybe they can ship parts out to you - call em!

Chuck

[Smitty]

here's the pics, sorry for the delay! picture set complete with captions for explanation purposes is here.

[Judas Jetski]

If a player-grade set is what you're really looking for, I wouldn't sweat the mismatched kit until I actually heard the drums. The floor tom from the Premier I had sounded just like my slingerland stuff once I got a brass hoop on the batter side. And last year I refurb'ed a '65 Ludwig 20-12-14 for a friend of mine, and set it up with a 16" floor tom from the 80's just for kicks... the sound was surprisingly consistent from drum to drum despite radical differences in construction. He wound up buying the 16" tom from me to go with the set, and it sounds great. I've had other mismatched drums that sounded good together.

I've often encountered this strange sort of tension when dealing with older instruments. I find myself trying to turn them into some sort of collectable, as though their value as a prize was somehow worth more than their value as an instrument. It still bugs me that I've built a '58 Slingerland set around a '62 snare...and that some of my hoops are nickel-plate rather than chromed. What a stupid thing to worry about! I mean, they're all even the same color, and still it bugs me--mostly when I'm not playing it. When I actually am playing it, all those weird little things go away and the set is magically transformed from a half-assed collectible into a viable musical instrument.

It's easy to get distracted into thinking that the inherent value of the instrument is based on its collectability rather than its sound. There is definitely value in putting time and money into a collectable piece (for instance, you'll know you can get your money back out of it if you have to sell it), but the thing to bear in mind is that (for the most part) it was the sound of this stuff that made it collectable in the first place.

Which isn't to say that there's no value in trying to "go with the flow" on these vintage things. The people who designed them were looking for something in particular, and if you can tune yourself into what they were shooting for you'll probably be happier with the results.

The Japanese poet Basho wrote that he didn't seek to follow the foosteps of his predecessors, but to seek what they sought. Here you are trying to find good tone out of well-constructed drums that are old enough and beat enough to be cheap cheap cheap (and maybe kinda hip, too). If you can understand how the drums are put together and what they're "trying" to "do" you'll be miles ahead of the guy who's trying to assemble a relic and make it perform like a modern drumset. Your old, beat-up set has been (perhaps mercifully) transformed into a blank slate. Go to town on it and make it into what you want! (Or, keep the pieces you like and start hitting the pawn shops for something similar to replace the parts you don't!)

Yep, I'm a windbag ... so as far as including something useful and practical... it seems to me that Ludwig drums from the mid-60s really seemed to set the standard for American drum designs in the years following. It might not be hard to find something of similar construction, if you should need to replace pieces.

[Smitty]

we're of a like mindset here, andy...

i actually sold a solid rosewood telecaster ("Rosie" reissue) from the 90's last year because it was, in many ways, too nice for me to keep. i was afraid to gig with it, and it was worth more as a collectible than it was as a playing instrument... i tend to like to keep that particular ratio working the other way, if you know what i mean.

the best thing about these drums is that they will never be collectible again. that gives me guilt-free-reign to do what i want to them, and i can use them and play them and hit them hard and if they get scratched, then oh well. they were wrecked to begin with.

i need a hoop and stable hardware for the bass drum (it seems kind of silly to get period-correct parts on that bass drum you see up there). if i like the way it sounds, then i'll likely refinish it to a decent stain and call it good.

i'm no drum guru, but i can't imagine covering the things with contact cement and sheets of plastic are going to do anything great for the resonance... always wondered about that with drums, actually. people bitch about poly-finishes on guitars as opposed to nitro. if you tried to glue stuff to them? whoa.

[Judas Jetski]

Those lugs almost look like Slingerland stuff. There were a bunch of close knock-offs of Slingerland in the '70s so it's kind of hard to tell, though. But the shells of these don't look like the knock-offs. The grain of the wood is parallel to the bearing edge which is a good thing, and the presence of the reinforcing hoops is a very good thing.

The keysone Ludwig badge is from the mid-60's I think (Brad'll probably know this one for sure, but the '65 set I worked on had the same badges). But that hardware says "slingerland or slingerland knock-off" to me. The drum shells don't look like maple to me, they look like mahogany. Can you tell what the shells are made of? Which drum has the keystone badge on it?

[Judas Jetski]

Also, you don't have to glue the wrap to the entire outside of the shell. I believe one would typically anchor one end of the wrap (noun), wrap (verb) the drum until the wrap (noun) overlaps itself, and glue it to itself there. I would defer to greater minds than my own, though.

[Smitty]

rack tom's the only one with the badge... who's hardware matches the bass drum. floor tom's the odd man out, hardware-wise.

[Judas Jetski]

That floor tom looks slingerland-y to me, but then so does the rack tom...One thing's for sure, that set is pretty well bastardized (that's definition 1: to change something so that its value declines, not definition 2 which concerns parentage). It looks like it was put together out of pretty decent stuff though, so you might have something to work with there.

I'd say it's time to start looking for a donor drum for hardware. Measure carefully... or better still pull some of the pieces and take them with you to your local old-school drum shop. They'll probably have a bunch of crappy old parts in a bin somewhere and you can start digging around for stuff that fits. Bear in mind that thread patterns for the lugs are often totally different from one brand to another, so when you're looking for lugs make sure they'll fit the hardware you're going to use. It's not essential to use compatible hardware but it's better if you can, because then you won't have to worry about getting your lugs switched around and accidentally stripping out threads. Also bear in mind that if these drums are as old and abused as they look, the screws may want to strip or snap off. WD-40 judiciously applied can make a huge difference, but remember you don't want a lot of that stuff getting into the wood shell of the drum....

[fromthecurve]

The bass drum Ts and claws are Slingerland style as well.

[???????]

The Ludwig badge is likely April, 1965.

HOWEVER, those are not Ludwig drums. At least not the lug casings and hardware save for the tom mount.

GOOD NEWS: Put the Ludwig badge on eBay. Someone will want it and you'll get a bit of your money back.

MORE GOOD NEWS: Sorta hard to tell for sure in the pix,but do the lug casings (on the 12 and maybe the bass drum) look like gretsch?

exhibit A:



Bad news: Mahogany shells, WTF? Gretsch was always Maple/Gumwood plies. So, not Gretsch. Not aware of any mahogany Gretsch drums in the era these were probably made (some very early ones maybe). There WERE mahogany Ludwig drums, but likely not in '65.

Weird news: Bass drum T's/Claws definitely look like the Slingerland ones sitting right here in front of me.

Floor tom lug casings look like "imitation Slingerland," i.e. slightly different than the Slingerland ones sitting right here in front of me. But the pics could be deceiving me. The floor tom leg mounts do not look like any I'm familiar with. I'd guess Japan for the floor tom at least.

This kit is a real mystery to me.

I'd say see if it looks like any paper labels inside the drums were painted over (in any of the drums, especially the 13" tom, whose lug casings sorta look Gretsch).

Other than that, who knows? But you definitely have a hodgepodge on your hands here!

[Smitty]

*IMPORTANT NOTE*

upon further inspection... they are actually cheap cardboard wastebaskets with pictures of drum hardware applied with crayon. inside of floor tom reads: JASON, AGE 7.

well, crap.

i was a little bit (likely medium bit) out of my element in terms of what these would be worth money/time/effort wise when i thought i knew what they were.

at this point, do you think it's worth trying to rehab the bass drum? it would probably require spending at least what i have in the whole kit at this point.

[inverseroom]

If they sound good, I would rewrap them, and have cool-looking, cool-sounding, unbranded drums.

I DID rewrap AndySmash's Premiers and I love 'em. It cost a couple hundred bucks for kick and two toms, and I will never be totally happy with the seams...but it is great getting to play a set of drums I helped fix up myself.

[Smitty]

the rack tom has been put in the corner for lying to me about it's origins, and when time-out is over, i'll get a new head on it, tune it up, and see how it sounds.

i think the floor tom sounds fine, even with the existing head and untuned. i don't have super-golden ears for drum sounds, but it seems to resonate nicely and has a good tone, methinks. so it's safe.

the bass drum, which is going to require significantly larger amounts of attention/cash moneys to even determine how it sounds, is significantly less safe. most likely bet is, it'll end up with a secondhand hoop and mismatched hardware.

[???????]

the good news is, the Ludwig badge and tom mount are not worthless. Somewhere there are a couple of kits missing a badge or two, and the owners of these kits will bid like hell against each other to get that badge from eBay.

So depending on how much you paid for the bastardized drums, you might not take a huge hit.

[Judas Jetski]

*IMPORTANT NOTE*

upon further inspection... they are actually cheap cardboard wastebaskets with pictures of drum hardware applied with crayon. inside of floor tom reads: JASON, AGE 7.

Yeah, but what color is the crayon? Jason used two different colors when he was 7. Burnt Sienna means it was made before July and therefore the more desirable set. There's still a market for the ones in aquamarine, though, and parts are easier to find.

Seriously, though, they seem to be well-constructed. You should be able to get some good tone out of them one way or another. Is the floor tom the same construction as the bass and 13"?