I use the Pearl ISO floor tom legs on my vintage Luddies and Gretschs, and the Pearl ISO snare stand for the Rack Toms (apart from on the Downbeat) and those old Toms sing as much as my new drums.

I use DW snare stands on the DW Racks (not those lug mounts) and they sing beautifully too. Actually a rail mount was provided with my Jazz series kit but I've never fitted it.

If I was made to strip back my collection I would keep the Downbeat (12-14-20), the Gretsch RB (13-16-22) and the Jazz series (13-16-18-24). That's everything I need right there. And yeah those Jazzers do sound incredible even though they were only made in 2009, and by that supposedly other-worldy demonic son of satan John Goode.

I agree with you larryz. The so call custom drum company's out there are getting out of hand with their bs , Dw and with so many others it's not about true sound it's all about bling bling and selling some pipe dream if you buy a 5000$ snare/kit you will have the best sounding drums on the planet , the truth is with just about any quality snare with proper heads and smart tuning any snare or drum will sound just fine . as a working drum tech i did a small show a few weeks ago and the head liner ripped his snare head on his Ayotte snare and i grabed my friends 14x6.5 cheap A$$ westbury metal snare that i set up for him a few weeks back and hooked up the mic and off he went , then i went to the sound board to hear the snare and the sound man tells me what kind of snare is that it sounds killer lol he did not belive me till the end of the show , it's nice to have big boy toy's and i have many of them but it's not important to blow a huge wad to get a sound that will get you thru the night .

There is definitely a market for the uber kit. First I heard of it was back in the 90's with the Pearl Masterworks series, they are stupidly expensive over the top kits that sound like.......erm..... Pearl Masters drums. I managed to buy one from a closing down sale for cost for £2000 back in 99 which made it reasonable(sim to Yammy MCA, Tama SC etc) instead of the original £5000!!! Then there's Sonor with the old designer series drums that cost even more, and now have the SQ2 drums that are probably the most priced up in the world. The construction system for ordering the shells alone is beyond me. DW are the American equivalent, and good luck to them. I don't crave a bling kit, and I've seen some DW wood finished kits with gold hardware that looks like somthing from my grannies front room. Urrrghhh! I happen to like the shells though(particularly on my Jazz set) so got them in a nice durable wrap at the normal going market rate, got the BD hoop inners painted black (don't like the maple finish) and I'm very very pleased. Try getting a quote for the Ludwig Legacy in the same sizes!

As for Vintage, if you want a baby Gretsch RB 3 ply I don't think any of the above companies could compete both in sound and, well...... how much does Steve Maxwell sell them for?

For all of you that remember my posting of my new Ludwig Classic Maple Downbeat kit, with matching 8-lug snare drum, that kit set me back about $1800... without hardware! Add the cost of leveling the edges on the toms and snare drum, better rims for the same drums, the cost of a Maxwell rail mount, vintage brackets, etc, etc, and the cost easily hit around $2100+!! I already had the stands, but if I didn't, tack on another couple of hundred dollars! Custom drums aren't cheap, but in the end, I got what I wanted. However, another new Ludwig kit in my future? Not a chance! Way too many assembly issues!

Mark

To answer your first question, people in the drum crazed 60's afforded it by buying the huge influx of MIJ kits.

As to C and C, they do manufacture their own shells so how they make that work fiscally is beyond me. Kudos to them if they can keep it up. It is a very competitive market place and the margins are razor thin.