Crazy No Stand Not A Cocktail Drum Kit

This is basically the same exact crazy drum kit as the last post, but I have improved it significantly. It went through two iterations that I tested for a few weeks each.

On the second version  I added an 8" Buffalo drum. I moved the snare wire from the 12" drum to the 8" drum. I still had to use a hi-hat stand (I have been trying to get away from stands altogether.)

The kit sounded nice, however, the 12" drum and 14" floor tom were both tuned to the same note. Since the 12" drum can't be tuned, I tried different tunings with the floor tom but nothing really sounded as good as the note I originally had it tuned to. Two toms tuned to the same note is pretty pointless, so I went ahead and removed the 12" drum.

Another issue with this version was the location of the ride cymbal. It covered a LOT of the floor tom head.  Because it was just slipped over the tom leg, it couldn't be raised up any more than it already was. I added a cymbal mount to the floor tom shell on the left side. This created 2 new problems: The 12 inch Buffalo drum was now almost completely covered (because of the ride and hi-hats) and the added weight made the drum kit a little bit unstable. I moved the cymbal mount to the right side.

Bird's eye view of version 2.

 I mounted a closed hi hat to the floor tom shell with a pair of 12" splash cymbals (completely mismatched but they sound great, both given to me by strangers at no cost). The little white mount peeking out just above the snare drum in the photograph is a post mount. I had mounted it to the 12 inch drum for use as a snare in a different drum kit. When I decided to use the Buffalo drum on this drum kit, I removed the post mount and drilled the floor tom to match the already existing holes in the Buffalo drum. When I added the hi hat arm, the post mount was my natural choice as the floor tom shell was pre-drilled for it. Modular drum building 101!

Version 3. Hi hats added, ride cymbal moved, 12" drum removed.

I'm using the same kick pedal, same ride cymbal, etc. This is a really compact drum kit - no stands. It is definitely NOT a cocktail drum kit - just a regular sit down drum kit configured differently.

This kit sounds fantastic, has a small footprint, and is easy to move - just pick it up and put it where you want it. It's really comfortable to play and is a very fast kit. I have been trying to build something like this for years.

I have owned a cocktail kit in the past and I was never really satisfied with the sound or the awkward (for me) playing position. I really like the Whitney Sidekick drum kits but they are out of my price range. This crazy drum kit is a compromise, using the best elements from both the cocktail kits and Whitney's Sidekick.

This kit was inexpensive to build.The bass drum pedal came from a cocktail kit that I bought for $40. I sold the kit and kept the pedal. I made a tidy profit on the kit so the pedal was free. The hi hats were free. The white post mount came off a snare drum that I sold, so it was free. The cymbal arm was free. My buddy Mikey gave me the (really nice) heads for free.

The floor tom came from a 4 piece kit that I bought for $40, so call it a $10 floor tom. The cymbal post mount was $10.The ride cymbal was $40. The Buffalo drum was $30. The hi-hat post was $20.

Total: $110.00 - for a real functioning drum kit that sounds great.

Crazy Tiny Not A Cocktail Drum Kit!

My newest crazy kit. I am too short for a normal sized cocktail kit, but I really like the idea of the "two in one" tom and bass drum.This kit sounds really amazing.14"x14" mid 60s Maxitone MIJ floor tom with a  Remo Black Suede head on the bottom, Remo Renaissance RA head on the top. Early 60s Ludwig Universal Speed Master kick pedal with a Vater Vintage Bomber  lamb's wool style beater. 12"x3.5" Remo Buffalo snare. The vintage no name 16" ride is on a super lightweight cymbal arm that just happens to slide down right over the floor tom leg. Early 60s Zildjian 14" hi hats on an early 60s Ludwig Model 1123-1  hi hat stand with Spur Lok heel plate. This is a fast little kit. The RA head really opens up the floor tom, allowing a nice deep tuning. The floor tom is one of the nicer MIJ models, with 8 lugs (offset!) The snare is just a Remo Buffalo drum that I screwed some snare wires into right under the head. There's a post on this blog showing how to do it - I love the way a Buffalo snare sounds - dry, dry, dry! I drilled two holes in the floor tom and bolted the snare right to the floor tom shell. Voila! A nice little 3 piece kit. I keep this one right beside my bed. I'll post some more pics here soon as well as video.

Crazy Solid Reso Head Bass Bikini Drum Kit!

It took a long time, but here is the latest crazy drum kit! The snare is a 12" Remo Buffalo drum with snare wires attached right under the head - my go to snare. I have been playing it with the snare off to the side - awesome playing position. I don't have to crossover to hit the hi-hats. Pretty cool. The bass drum is a 22" Pearl bass drum from the late 1960s, cut down to 5.5". I installed a re-ring on the resonant side for support. The resonant side has no bearing edge cut - it's flat! The resonant side head is a 1/4" thick piece of maple glued into the shell. The port hole is 3 inches in diameter. I used an Aquarian Superkick I on the batter side. The hoop is 1 1/2" 12 ply maple from my friends at Precision Drum. The drum sounds amazing - punchy, low toned, and a bit muffled - classic rock style thud. I will post video of it in action soon!

Crazy Mini Buffalo Kit!

Introducing the Crazy Mini Buffalo Kit!
8" snare, 10" tom and a 14" bass drum - all mounted to the snare stand.

Click here to see a video of me playing it.

It took a little wrangling with clamps to get the bass drum stable and positioned correctly. I'm no fan of muffling drums, but the 14" Buffalo drum was a little too pingy, so I put some foam in it. The foam really gives it a nice thud.

The tom sounds like a roto-tom and the snare is very dry and popcorny.

The whole thing weighs about 8 pounds - including the snare stand and clamps.

This would be a great kit for busking - super portable and it sounds great! I'm going to cut down some crappy hi-hats that I have to a 10" diameter - the 14" hats are just too loud for this tiny kit.

Front view:

Side view - look how shallow the shells are!

From the driver's seat:

A view of the clamps I used to attach the bass drum to the snare stand.
The black clamp is a rim-mount accessory clamp. The silver clamp is a post clamp.
I picked up the threaded rod at a hardware store for about a buck.

Buffalo Kit video!

Here it is - a video of me playing the Buffalo kit!

 Click here to see the Buffalo kit!

Crazy Buffalo Drum Kit updated!

Well, here is the finished version of the Buffalo Kit! This drum kit is pretty crazy! It is also one of the most portable kits I have ever built  - without the hardware and cymbals, the six shells weigh maybe 12 pounds. I have added 2 more toms to it. You can't really see it in the picture, but there is a 5/16" foot long screw screwed through one of the pre-drilled holes at the top of the bass shell. The screw goes through a post clamp that is mounted to the ride cymbal stand. This helps to keep the bass drum super stable and prevent it from moving, since there are no spurs on it. I originally tried mounting the long screw through the side of the bass drum shell, but it wasn't nearly as stable as the current through-the-top version. My buddy Mikey came up with the idea of putting the screw through the top. The bass drum doesn't move at all now. The tiny shell by the hi-hat is an 8" snare; there are 8", 10" 12" and 14" toms as well. All the shells are 3.5" deep. All the toms and snare are bolted together using the pre-existing holes in the shells.  The entire snare/tom assembly sits on a snare basket. No hardware, no tuning, weather proof, water proof, bullet proof (nearly!). I love this kit. The hi-hats I'm using are 1961 Zildjian 14" beauties - they are really jazzy and dry. The ride cymbal is a 20" Sabian B8 that I found in the gutter one day. (Really!) That's a poster of Neil Peart and his Time Machine tour kit on the wall behind me.

I loved this kit - it incorporated all the elements I was trying to include in my crazy drum kits - lightweight, easy to set up/tear down, weather resistant, and inexpensive. However, as of February 2015, there is no more Buffalo Drum kit - I sold the various parts. I'm waiting for Remo to figure this out and bring out their version of it.

Truly an amazing little crazy drum kit, and I'm glad I made it!

Crazy Buffalo Drum Kit!

I've been using a snare drum that I made from a Remo Buffalo Drum for almost 2 years now. There's a post on here somewhere showing how to do it. I absolutely love the dry sound I get from my Buffalo snare. I decided to make a whole kit from Buffalo Drums. I had a 22" Buffalo Drum laying around that I had intended to turn into a portable bass drum. I drilled a couple holes in a board and used 2 bolts to attach the 22" drum to the board. The board allows me to use a bass drum pedal with the Buffalo Drum (since there is no rim). I then taped some sheets of cork to the bottom of the non-batter side of the board in order to lift it up and make it level. The cork is also nice and non-slip, an unexpected benefit. I used some hippie ass looking duct tape to secure the cork to the board. I bought the board at a thrift store for one US dollar ($1). The sheets of cork were 25 cents apiece. I used three sheets of cork to level the board. The pic below shows the board and bolts. (All of the Buffalo Drums come with convenient holes pre-drilled in them for rope handles. The holes are 5/16").

22" drum bolted to the board.

The finished bass drum assembly.

I had been using my 14" Buffalo drum as a snare, but I wanted it for a 'floor' tom. I cut some snare wires to length and screwed them into an 8" Buffalo Drum (which makes a super dry popcorn type snare sound, almost like a drum machine snare sound!). I then bolted the 8", 14" and 10" Buffalo Drums together to create my tom/snare set up. The pic below shows the snare wires and bolts. These drums are so light that I can put the whole thing in a snare basket!

The bottom side of the snare/tom assembly.

Top view of the snare/tom assembly. Snare is on the left.

The Buffalo Kit is pretty high pitched and there's no way to tune it. It sounds like hand drums being played in kit fashion (of course, because that's what it is!). It's a lot quieter than a normal drum kit, making it perfect for apartments or small spaces. I want to add two more Buffalo Drums to it as toms. The snare/tom assembly weighs maybe 4-5 pounds, the bass drum assembly maybe 4 pounds (without the pedal). I set the tom/snare assembly up in front of the bass drum. This is a super fast kit, with no space between the drums at all! It sounds great though! Set up time is about ten seconds. Put the drums in the snare basket, clip on the bass pedal and it's ready to go. This is a great kit for people on a budget! The Buffalo Drums will cost you about $160-190 total, depending on which sizes you buy and how many you use. This is a great practice kit - leave your full sized kits at the rehearsal studio and play this bad boy at home!

The fully assembled Buffalo Kit!

I have given away every Crazy Drum Kit that I've built, but this one is a keeper and will be with me for many years to come. (LIES! I sold most of these.) The shells are weather proof! Super light, super easy to set up/tear down, and the shells are only 3.5 inches deep, making them easy to nest inside of each other. Although this kit does not sound like a full sized kit, it's a great alternative for small spaces where you need to play quietly.This kit is good for playing outside too! Another benefit is that you never need to tune it. I really love this little bastard. I've been playing the shit out of it.

Crazy Tiny Square Snare Kit

This is my newest crazy drum kit. The bass drum is a 14" X 9" drum from a kid's kit. I stripped the hardware and wrap, refinished the wood, and put it back together. I used a coated head for the batter side. The drum was given to me.

The snare drum is made from a cheap wooden box that I picked up at a thrift store for 75 cents. I sanded it, stained it and varnished it. The bass drum is sitting on a wire basket that I payed 75 cents for at the thrift store.

A friend sold me the bass head for $2.50. I used about one dollar's worth of stain, finish and sandpaper. The hi-hat stand is from a Ludwig child's kit. The hi-hats were given to me.

The bass pedal is my old trusted Pearl pedal. Total cost for this kit: 5 American dollars. The snare sounds super dry and is very similar to a cajon. There are no snare wires in it, but it sounds like a snare! The bass drum is deep toned, but I had to muffle it to get the proper bass tone.

The Little Monster

The Little Monster!! This kit is a 12" X 10" Peace tom with a snare basket mounted on top. I screwed some angle irons to a wooden box and then attached a piece of wood to the angle irons (to clamp the kick pedal on). I had to cut down a cymbal post to about 4 inches long to slide into the tom holder on top of the tom, in order to hold the snare basket (the basket post was too narrow for the tom holder.) The little bass drum is tuned wide open and NOT muffled for a big beefy sound. I'm delighted with how great The Little Monster sounds. The snare is, of course, my Buffalo snare, but any snare can be used. The hi-hat pedal is a tiny little kids hi-hat that matches this kit perfectly. The whole thing is 27" high by 12" deep by 15" wide, making it officially the smallest kit I've ever built. Here's what it looks like set up:

One Stand To Rule Them All!

I call this... One Stand To Rule Them All! I used a cymbal stand as the base. I stuck a tom holder in the cymbal base. I clamped on a snare basket. I clamped on a cymbal boom. Instant drum kit! Here's a view of it set up:

Here's a view of it by itself:

Here's a side view so you can see how it's done:

The snare is my much-loved Buffalo Snare. The tom is a 14X14 Pearl Export series that I refinished. The cymbal is an 18" Sabian B8 crash/ride. Since I normally play a 3 piece set up, this is really good for me. Very fast and natural feeling.

Cocktail Restoration

UPDATE: Here is a pic that Mikey sent me of the drum set up. I went and played it and it's dreamy. He's using the roto-toms, bell, and remote hi-hat. The stuff behind that is another one of his kits.

Here is the Slingerland cocktail kit that I found for $30. It had heavy water damage and the wrap was pretty well destroyed, so I decided to refinish it. I spent over 40 hours working on this drum and it shows. I sold it for a goodly sum and the new owner (Mikey) is very happy with it. Once Mikey tuned it, it sounded fantastic.

That wrap had to come off, so I started peeling it very carefully with a hairdyer and a paint scraper.

Before the shell could be sanded, the old glue (and glitter from the wrap) had to be stripped off. I used a very caustic paint stripper because the glue was old and kind of embedded in the grain of the wood. I got really high off the paint stripper and had to leave the room several times. The fumes gave me a pretty ruthless headache that I knocked down with some beers.

Once the shell was clean, I sanded it for a very long time - 25 hours of the labor in this project went into the sanding. Then I stained it (very lightly) and sanded it some more. Then I started coating it with a non-VOC floor finish that I like to use because it is absolutely brilliant. This picture is after two coats of poly.

After days of drying and re-coating (five coats of poly in all) the drum looked like this:

I was extremely happy with the way this project turned out. It was hard to sell this beauty, so I sold it to a good friend who I know will love it!

Another Frankenkit

Another Frankenkit that I built. The tom is a Peace tom ($10 at a thrift store). The kick drum is a Pearl Export series 22" (free - a gift from a friend) that I refinished. The snare is the now famous Buffalo Snare ($39). So total cost for the 3 shells - $49. That's right, less than fifty dollars and it sounds absolutely brilliant. The hi-hats cost me 40 bucks (jilted lover selling things) and the ride cymbal was free - I found it in the gutter, literally (along with a 7 piece kit, but that's another story.) The kick pedal is some cheap ass Pearl pedal, and the hi-hat stand is an Iron Cobra (of course!) The hi-hat pedal is the most expensive thing on the kit. This kit sounds thunderous and is super easy to set up and take down. There is a cocktail kit hanging out in these pics that doesn't belong there.

Buffalo Snare

This is my snare. I bought a cheap ($39 new!) Remo Buffalo Drum(hand drum) and screwed a set of snare wires into it. The Buffalo Drum shell is made of Acousticon and the head is Fiberskyn, both proprietary materials that Remo invented that are water, temperature and weather proof. After 7 months of playing, there isn't even a mark on the head. The head is bonded to the shell and there is no hardware on this drum. It weighs about one and a half pounds.

I used a 20 strand Puresound snare. I cut one of the ends off as well as about 4 inches of the snare wire. I attached the remaining end to the shell with a screw.

Inside view. I just used duct tape to hold the snare wires to the drum head's surface. There is no throw off so this is a full time snare drum. This drum is super dry and tasteful! No bottom head=lots of projection to cut through the mix.

Frankenkit

Here is a kit that I built a couple of years ago - "Frankenkit"

The drums I used were :
14" X 6" Ludwig Supraphonic Snare
18" Remo Roto-Tom
14" Remo Roto-Tom
28" X 9" Ludwig? marching bass drum

I attached the Roto-Toms to the ride stand with various clamps. I had clamp on spurs for the marching band bass drum. I just used a snare stand for the snare. The idea was to create a kit that was easy to transport and easy to set-up and tear down. Instead, this thing was a bitch to move because of the odd sized bass drum. Set up and tear down took about 30-40 minutes. My experiment turned out to be a pain in the ass. This is probably the only good picture of Frankenkit.

On the up side, this kit sounded great! The extra large Roto-Toms had a depth of tone that the smaller ones can't even touch. The bass drum was a monster - sounded like a cannon. The Supraphonic snare was awesome and loud. I have since sold all of these drums and I am still kicking myself.

Two more views of Frankenkit :

Crazy Tiny Kit

Update: Tore the kit apart for hardware. The 16"x16" tom/kick just wasn't loud enough. Sadness. I'm still using the 10" tom. I gave the snare to a friend who needed one. The 16" tom is sitting in the garage, waiting to be used for another project.

I've just finished building my Crazy Tiny Kit!
Total Cost : $82 (including new heads!)

Materials :
16" X 16" floor tom
12" X 10" rack tom
12" X 5" snare drum
2 single tom mounts (1 to mount to snare drum, 1 for ride stand)
1 double tom bass drum mount
4" wide piece of board (for mounting kick pedal)
2 screws w/ nuts (for mounting kick pedal)

I bought a Peace 16" X 16" floor tom and a matching 12" X 10" rack tom at a thrift store for $20! I used a Ludwig Accent snare drum (12" X 5") that I had in the garage. I just happened to have the hardware laying around. If you were to buy the hardware, you would spend approximately $80, give or take a few bucks.

I laid the floor tom on its side to use it as a kick drum. Thanks to Lane Hughes at Lane Hughes Woodworking (Salt Lake City) for helping me. Lane drilled the holes for me for $20. If you attempt this madness, be aware that you need a drill press to drill the larger holes for the tom posts. If you attempt to drill the large holes with a hand drill, you'll probably split the shell.

I attached both a single and double tom mount to the top of the floor tom. Placement of the mounts was key. I attached the double tom mount closer to the back of the bass drum (batter side) to allow the snare and tom to be placed closer to me. I attached the single tom mount closer to the resonant head side, in hopes that the ride cymbal, once mounted, would counterbalance the other two drums. (It does!)

I attached a single tom mount to the snare drum. (Snare is the maroon colored drum.)

I put new heads ($42) all the way around - thanks to Dave at House of Guitars for hooking me up. I guess I could've been cheap and used the shitty heads that were already on the shells, but I wanted these babies to sound nice.

Here's what I used:

12" Remo Emperor coated on the snare (Weatherking)
16" Remo Pinstripe clear as the bass drum head
12" Remo pinstripe clear for the tom head.


The kit sounds great, and I only have to use one stand - the hi-hat. Everything else is mounted right on the tiny little bass drum.Don't let the tiny bass drum fool you! The sound is enormous and low-pitched. The 12" X 5" snare adds a really dry pop sound that I like a lot. The 12" X 10" tom is sweet.

The kick drum pedal is attached to a piece of redwood fencing that I cut to about 8" length. I drilled two holes about 2" apart in the bottom of the shell, then attached the board with some screws. I had to cut a notch in the board in order to allow the kick pedal clamp to close all the way. The board also raised the batter side of the kick drum up about 2 inches. For legs, I just turned the tom legs until they held up the whole operation. Pretty slick.

For a sense of scale, here is my new micro-kit next to the bass drum from my Ludwig Epic kit!

And another shot of micro-kit side by side with just the bass drum from my Ludwig Epic kit.Pretty crazy how tiny this new kit is!