Hi Gang,
Living in St. Louis and being a Vintage Drum enthusiast, I of course had to have a Duplex in my collection.
Usually they fall WAY outta my price range. However a week ago I won an e-bay auction for a 16" Steel Shell Duplex Snare.
We all know its not steel.
So for a tidy sum I won the drum and it arrived today.
WOW
Is a Nickle over Brass shell, very very thin brass and an even thinner layer of Nickle, with a wood band at the center of the shell.
The shell has very wide snare beds and has only one end of a "strainer", which appears to be the tension adjustment.
The odd part is, there is no "butt" end, or even holes for one in the shell or rim....how was the butt end fastened? Anyone???
The tension end of the strainer is a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. A tube lug has had a slot machined into the back to give a travel range of adjustment. The mounting bolt has an extended pin end to it that allows for a travel stop, simple and elegant.
The snare jaws are like that of modern strainers, two bolts and a pair of jaws to grab the ends.
Inside the Brass hoops are wood bands as well that make up the bulk of the rim thickness. The NOB wrap is simply that..a wrap. One bottom of each rim, there are roman numerals stamped into the wood. Each rim is different.
All of the hardware is fastened by a single machine screw from the inside of the shell/rim.
Every tension rod boss is an individual unit on the rim, each a little different from the other.
The Tube lugs have "Duplex" cast into their bases around the face and are threaded inside for the tension rods.
Some of them have come loose from the pedestal and can spin, others remain tight as new.
The tension rods appear to be mostly correct, with 2 screws used to replace the two missing tension rods.
The grommet/badge,
At first I thought it was steel, rusty and old.
Upon closer inspection, the actual vent grommet is wooden! The badge around it is NOB like the rest of the drum. The wooden vent grommet is
glued/pressed into the shells wooden band....still solid and unmovable.
The heads that came with appear to be calf, only a small hole in the batter head.
So far I've disassembled the drum shell, cleaned it and hydrated the VERY dry interior ring.
The shell has been cleaned in the past with something far to abrasive as the nickle is worn thin between the lugs.
Under the lugs and flesh hoops its shiny as the day it was made!
I still need to clean the lugs, strainer, rims etc.
But for now, I've got it and am so happy to have this piece of local, and percussion as a whole, history in my collection.
many pics to come, so hang tight!
If you have ANY info as to how the snares we're attached w/o a butt plate, please let me know.
Im also looking for a set of 16" (actually 15 1/2") correct "wires" as well. Im guessing they were gut back then.
