First of all, alot of you already know that I have played a vintage Sonor kit for a long time already, and may feel that I will be delivering a biased review. I will try to include the good and the not-so-good in thie review as appropriate to my observations. This will be an honest review if nothing else.
The kit arrived in exactly one week from date of purchase. That's from PA to CA. Pretty impressive, UPS!
It was in just two boxes. One had the kick and floor, unassembled, with all the tom mounting hardware (in the corners) and heads. The other box had all the toms and snare assembled along with the floor legs. Everything arrived in perfect condition.
I started with the kick, of course. The shell is gorgeous in all its red sparkly goodness with a really sharp bearing edge. The hoops are also very nice; visible plies of maple on the edges with the red sparkle on the outside and clear on the inside.
I think the stock batter head is a Powerstroke of some sort. It is simply labeled REMO with no other name for the head. I gave it a pretty quick even tuning, leaned on it to get out the crackles, evened out the head again and BOOM! I added the reso (black head with logo in white) with a 3" strip of felt across the bottom 1/3 and, again, a brief tuning to get an even fuller BOOM!! I could not beleive how fast it came together.
I added a thin pad to the batter head and a 5" port right under the 'R' in the logo. The volume and depth of pitch is something I could never hope to get out of my old 18" kick. I love this thing. The response is great too. I am able to still pick out doubles clearly. The kick alone was almost worth the price. I tweaked the lugs that first day and have not needed to since.
The snare was next up, of course. Coated amb on top and clear amb on bottom. The drum came tuned really low, so I cranked her up on both sides, found a nice clear tone and evened out the heads, and, again, voila, she is done. I was again stunned at how fast the drum tuned up. Something to be said for clean bearing edges, eh?
Since I went from a 13 x 4 maple snare to a 14 x 5.5 maple snare, the difference is too subtle for my ear to find. I feel like I'm playing the same sound I loved about my old Pork Pie snare, which is going with the old Sonors to my brother.
I won't bore you with a tom by tom account of the rest of the kit. Suffice to say that the toms all tuned up as readily as the kick and snare with clear tones and full sounding thumps. Even the 10"!
I was very leary of using a 13" tom in a "floor tom" position, but not anymore. This is becoming my favorite tom very quickly. Plenty of low end woof to complement the firm thump of the attack. Very satisfying.
I am still not in love with the 16" floor, but I blame the head choice. I think I will be able to get the tone I want out of her with a double ply head, so meanwhile, I save some pennies by beating the life out of the stock head.
The tom mount is awesome. There is seperate height mounts for each tom with a ball and socket fitting that is very solid, so far. I have the 13" tom on the extra arm off of my ride cymbal stand and it is also a great piece of hardware.
The one thing I am truly dissappointed with is the snare throw off. It is mostly plastic, and feels like it. I am told that this is the standard throw off switch that they put on nearly all of their snares.
Easily changed out if I so decide. Minor detail in comparison to the rest of the positive attributes of this kit.
The final deciding factor was that I found a great deal on EB. Dales in PA was blowing out the end of the '09 inventory and I couldn't pass it up. I had gotten my list down to just 5 other kits, but this deal won out in the end.
Only $730 to my door!!
Can't post photos but here's a quick vid.
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAWmh2ReO4g"]YouTube- John Giambalvo-Sonor Force 3007 Demo(2).MPG[/ame]
I'll let you know how they go over at their first gig at the end of April.
Peace and rhythm.
Proudly playing:
Doc Sweeney Drums
A bunch of snares
A bunch of cymbals
Off-Set double pedals
I think I love to play the drums simply because you get to hit 'em!!!
Very nice. Where are the Sonor's manufactured?
Custom Classic Pro Maple 6
8",10",12",13" Mounted Toms
(2)14",16" Floor Toms
22" x 18" Kick
6",8",10" Roto Toms
14" x 6.5" Mapex Black Panther Snare
13" x 3" Pearl Piccolo Snare
Sabian: 13" Paragon Hats
14" HH X Hats
22" Paragon Ride
(2) 16" Paragon Crashes
20" Paragon Crash
18" Paragon Crash
20" Paragon Small Flange China
19" Paragon China
Wuhan:20"with gingles
8",10" Splash
Roc N Soc Lunar
DW 8002B Pedals
Tambourine
Cowbell
Sabian Squad
C C Militia
Hey they sound great...you will wet yourself though when you put on new heads. They will come alive!
Just gigged with mine tonight and afterward, a keyboard player whom I had never met before, came up and told me he loved the sound of my toms (I was using a 13" Black Panther snare this time). I just bought a set of the new EC-2s (SST) today, but ran out of time so the old EC2s are still on there. They have been there since April and I'm still getting comments.
Keep that FT tuned low. My experience is that shell wants to be a kick drum when it grows up so I have it tuned accordingly.
I did have the chance to put a coated G1 on my BP which was fun!
Congrats again on the new tubs.
Next week, my gig is at a much smaller venue so I will be using my Mapex Manhattan. I love going between the two of these set ups. Keeps me fresh mentally.
Sonor's Force 3000 series(originally made as a mid level kit) was first made in Germany, until the 3001 series came about. After that, the factory moved it's mid-level lines to China where they handled Force series kit production. The shells are supposedly Scandinavian, where as the German factories make their shells in-house. The more expensive professional lines, such as S-Classix and Delites are made in Germany, but the less expensive Sonors are still being made in Chinese factories and imported from there.
ZildjianLeague/LP/Aquarian/Mapex/Pearl
Snares: 4
RIP- Frank, Wolvie, Les Paul
Forum Rules
DrumBum
No metronome?
The Rudiments
Thanks xsabers.
Funny you should mention it, because over the past week, I have continued to lower and lower the pitch of that drum. I think I only realized what was happening day before yesterday. Did it naturally in search of the best tuning. Just sounds fuller at the lower register. Interesting that it would appear to be a cross the board trait of their 16 FT's?
I was planning on being semi-frugal and using clear emporers as they are still reasonably priced and give a nice clear tone with controlable ring.
I have never spent the little bit extra for Evans although since comin here, I am hearing more and more of you swear by them.
We'll see what kind of $'s the band pulls in and I'll upgrade accordingly.
I'll try and join Photobucket so I can post pics because they look alot better in the stills with a flash. Or I gotta move alot more light into my garage for another vid!
Thanks again.
Proudly playing:
Doc Sweeney Drums
A bunch of snares
A bunch of cymbals
Off-Set double pedals
I think I love to play the drums simply because you get to hit 'em!!!
Man those 3007's sound so deep and godly. I love your new kit's sound Johnny!
ZildjianLeague/LP/Aquarian/Mapex/Pearl
Snares: 4
RIP- Frank, Wolvie, Les Paul
Forum Rules
DrumBum
No metronome?
The Rudiments
Thanks Russ.
What more could one drummer ask to hear from another drummer? Just the kind of reaction I was after.
Peace and rhythm.
Proudly playing:
Doc Sweeney Drums
A bunch of snares
A bunch of cymbals
Off-Set double pedals
I think I love to play the drums simply because you get to hit 'em!!!
Nice finish on the shells! Love to hear them mic'd and live. Great review!
Great review! And they do sound and look fantastic!
Matt
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