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Worth trying to rebuild this kit?

Started by NY Frank, November 19, 2010, 01:02 PM

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NY Frank

We found an old, forgotten, Slingerland cocktail kit in the attic.  No hw - just 3 shells.
I think the shells are 16" bass, 10" snare, 8" tom.

The wraps are cracked and peeling.  The shells themselves seem ok / not cracked.   Do you think it would be worth the energy and small investment to turn this into a tiny, portable jazz kit?

- I'd peel off the wraps and try to sand off the glue.   You think what would be left would be finishable?   I wouldn't need it to look perfect - I'm not fussy.   As far as the finish goes, Pretty Good would be Good Enough.  :)

- I'd cut the 16" stand up bass tom and flip it over.   I have access to people/tools to do this - via being very fortunate to live minutes from Precision Drum Company.   They'd do those cuts for very low dollars.

- I'd have Precision re-do the bearing edges because that's obviously important and these are probably cut poorly.

- I'd need some hardware to put this all together.

I'm wondering mainly because - I don't know what's underneath those wraps, and whether or not these shells are worthy of the effort.   It would be fun, though, if this flew.   I think some of you here have pretty small kits.   I'm about to go Search again - I think some of you have 16" bass-based tiny kits.

Thoughts?       Thanks.

donelk

I say do it for the fun. Spend the money as you get it... one step at a time.

I play a 16x16 bass drum all the time... will play it twice this weekend!

NY Frank

Thanks.

Yeah - I'm not worried about the 16 as the bass.  I play an 18 now, and it's fine, and I'm sure the 16 will be, too.   

Biggest thought is - what's beneath that wrap?     :)   

KevinD

Hey Frank,

Welcome back! Good to see you back here. Man, you must have a much better attic than I do, I never find anything cool like that up in my attic!

What was the color of the wrap?
Can you post a photo of the set?

You may just want to hold off cutting it up because some of those old Slingy cocktail sets can be worth quite a bit.

There are some old Slingerland catalogs out on the web where you may be able to find that particular model and that would help you date the kit. As I understand it Slingerland didn't have serial numbers in any uniform or contiguous scheme until sometime in the mid the 1960s.

I saw one in blue sparkle from 1939 and it went for quite a bit.

The folks from Precision could probably tell you though.

I wouldn't worry about what is under the wrap I would just wrap it in a vintage style.

Good luck with it!

Kevin


Chris Whitten

I wouldn't cut any drums either.
It doesn't stop you from using it as a bass drum.
Who knows what's underneath.
I stripped my Camco kit, sanded it and rubbed danish oil on the shells to finish them. Easy to do and it looks great.

Chip Donaho

Quote from: Chris Whitten on December 03, 2010, 03:23 PM
I stripped my Camco kit, sanded it and rubbed danish oil on the shells to finish them. Easy to do and it looks great.
Would that be the same as linseed oil? I've fixed drums and kept everything as close to original as possible. But striping old covering off isn't hard. Anything thin and somewhat strong will work. Just push it under the old covering and lift. If you sand the shells go "with" the direction of the wood grain. Then you just stain the wood and your sanding won't show. But if you're recovering you can go right over the old stuff as long as it's holding good to start with. Wood grain looks great when done right.  ;)