Facts:

People abuse/misuse each other... so don't be surprised that some of them also abuse/misuse their belongings.

Buy enough drums, for long enough, and you'll eventually find one of these abuse victims.

If they're beyond saving, I just feel bad for them for a moment and then I pass. If it's something I can save, then what comes out the other end of the process is a useable musical instrument that has had some years of life added back.

Don't let it mess with your head when you find one that's been mistreated. Just the way it is in a consumer driven 'disposable world'...

John

The drummer of a former band I was in laughed about how after a gig at a club at a local beach he'd roll the B.D. down the sidewalk to his car. 9/72 Rogers Fullerton's I rescued 20 years ago. All the Swivo parts were destroyed. The arm was snapped off the strainer on the 6 1/2" Black Beauty. The rear B.D. rim was split in half and duct-taped together. No bottom heads. All broken cast collets. Huge gouges in the black wrap. Not 1 pedal or stand functioned correctly. He had to stop playing because of a painful shoulder issue, so I bought them for $100 and my first true complete restoration began. So I know where you're coming from...

> laughed about how after a gig at a club at a local beach he'd roll the B.D. down the sidewalk to his car.

The shortest distance between a disaster and the a$$hole responsible for it is a straight line.

John

I seen an Ayotte custom snare drum that had one of the lugs pulled out of the shell, leaving a gaping hole.... from over tensioning.

And that was a 1200 dollar snare drum ten years ago.

Some people don't get it. and they never will. They usually become guitar players.

So he made a custom nine-lug vented snare...

And that's why I have to smirk at all these young guys who discuss exotic woods, resonance, number of plies, etc, and then go crank the $#!t out of the batter head until their snare drum sounds like a temple block. Wasn't this a trend a few years back? Fine Young Cannibals comes to mind.

Mike

Certain kinds of stupidity are very hard to Darwin out of the gene pool.

Just imagine what havoc can be wrecked with single tension snare lugs that only have a single anchoring fastener through the shell.

They usually become guitar players.Hurting

That was awesome Ploughman!

I used to be amazed the condition a drum set could get into. I recall a very, very good drummer who had a late '50s Gretsch set with black wrap (probably wasn't original) batter heads only on all three drums; in fact no lugs on the opposite sides from batter heads. He threw the three one inside the other to take them to a gig. Amazingly enough, he could make them sound great. Go figure!