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The History of the Drum – Early History

October 18, 2011 in Drums History with 0 Comments

Drums – Early History

Modern drums have evolved from rudimentary instruments that were played by beating with the hands and/or sticks. Early man probably beat out rhythms on rocks or fallen trees. The earliest recognized drum dates back some 8,000 years to Mesopotamia – specifically the Babylonian and Sumerian empires. Ancient drums consisted of animal skin stretched across some sort of hollow shell. Another form of early drum consisted of hollowed out logs that were beat with sticks.

In the Middle East, the drum was revered as an instrument by which to call the Love and Fertility Goddess Innana, among others. The sound of the drum was considered ennobling or sacred. Large barrel drums were controlled by the high priest and protected by a drumguard. The “balaq” was shaped as if two horns were affixed to each other, and both ends were covered in skin. Ancient illustrations show Sumerian drummers carrying their drums using leather belts slung over the shoulder. Besides its use in religious ceremonies, Sumerian drums were used for civilian and military meetings.

Drum Building Tools for the Advanced Drum Builder

March 23, 2011 in Drum Building 101, Drum Building Resources, Drums with 4 Comments

Here is the 2nd part to the “Drum Building Tools” series. In this post I briefly discuss some of the drum building tools and supplies that you might want to get your hands on if you plan on building drums more often than just once. Again if you only want to build a snare, or even a full kit, but you don’t want to invest in buying tools, refer to this blog post to learn about building drums with only a screwdriver.

Advanced Drum Building Supplies and Tools

Tools I own and use for cutting bearing edges:

A Router
Router Bits
A Router Table
-You can buy router tables from most hardware stores, but I recommend building your own table so you can easily route drums that are larger in diameter than standard router tables allow. (I have router table building plans in the eBook)

A “Truing” Sanding Table
-There are many ways of going about making a truing table, which I explain in the eBook. The basic idea of using a truing table is to allow you to start, and make sure that your edge remains perfectly tru all the way around the bearing edge, in other words start with a flat and level edge, and make sure the bearing edge doesn’t have dips or curves. Continue Reading....

Black Sparkle Custom Drum Set

June 18, 2010 in Drums, General Updates, Reader's Drum Pictures with 0 Comments

I had a post in April talking a little about this kit, but I wanted to update you on the finished product. This is a very classic sized kit: 14×22, 8×13, and 16×16.

I learned a lot from building this kit. Just a few things I learned from this build:

"Nonflammable" contact cement is a product that I will avoid at all costs from now on.
I love the "Gel" form of contact cement because it is much easier to work with. No runs = no mess!
Video taping yourself building drums is harder than I thought.
I realized I like notching the overlap near the bearing edge for wrapped drums, but it also is harder than it seems.
I love chrome tube lugs. They bring class to any drum.
I made a new document to include in the Ebook – it is a checklist for ordering drum supplies, because even I forget to order supplies every now and then.

How to Wrap a Drum Shell Part 2

March 24, 2010 in Drum Building 101, Drum Building Tutorials, Drums, General Updates with 1 Comment

This is the 2nd and last post on how to wrap your drum shells! Enjoy! Check out the first post here. Another important blog post to view along with this post is “How to Keep your Wrap Seams From Coming Up“.

After you have made sure there is not sanding dust on the wrap or on the shell you can apply your contact cement. If you have already drilled your holes for hardware you may want to tape the inside up so that no contact cement can run on the inside of the shell. Use a paint brush or roller brush to apply the contact cement to the shell, the back of the wrap, and the overlap! You’ll need to apply 2 coats to achieve maximum adhesion, and you can do them one right after the other. Leave no space uncovered or else you’ll have some bubbles in your wrap. Make sure you really get the overlap good! Consult the directions on your contact cement to get the best results.

Most contact cement needs about 15-30 minutes of drying time BEFORE you try to put the wrap on the shell. When the glue dries on all surfaces you may proceed. – Attention! – The glue must be dry for you to have a permanent bond, it sounds counter intuitive, but trust me, if you try to stick things together with contact cement when the cement is not completely dry, it will become un-bonded over time.

How to pay if you don’t have Paypal

February 3, 2010 in General Updates with 0 Comments

If you want to buy "How to Make Custom Drums" but don't have a Paypal account you can use your credit card or bank account to pay for it. Paypal still takes care of it, and I have nothing to do with processing the account information in case you were worried about that.

How to Wrap a Drum Shell Part 1

January 5, 2010 in Drum Building 101, Drum Building Tutorials, Drums, General Updates with 4 Comments

Using a wrap to finish your drum is a great way to get an outstanding finish in very little time. If you are wrapping multiple drums you should find out if your wrap supplier has specific configurations already cut to size for your drums, if not you’ll need to calculate how much wrap you will actually need to buy to be able to cover all your drums. If you are unsure of how to do this, just ask your supplier to help you figure it out. First you will need to cut your wrap to size. An easy way to do this is to wrap it around your drum shell and mark the edge of the shell all the way around. This shows how to wrap a bass drum. If your wrapping a smaller shell follow the directions below as follows, but you’ll just end up with one seam

(Some wrap manufacturers don’t make wrap to go all the way around large drums, so you’ll end up having to use 2 pieces for larger drums – mark your cut line around the top of the shell)

(What your 2^nd piece of wrap for larger drums will look like, this will go on the bottom of a 22” kick)

You may use a sharp pair of scissors to cut the wrap. Sparkles are a little easier to cut than glass glitter wraps. Plan on sharpening your scissors frequently if you need to cut a lot of wrap. After you cut your wrap to the length of your shell, you’ll need to cut it down to the diameter of your shell. An easy way to do this is to use a flexible measuring tape (for sewing) to measure all the way around the shell and add an extra inch for overlap. Now lay the wrap down flat and measure out that distance and use a straight edge to mark your next cut. Continue Reading....