My tunning issues

[Lil drummerboy71]

Ok I have a Ludwig Accent.

Shell Material: Philippine Juniper Inside, Mahogany Outside
* Shell Plies: 7
* Shell Thickness: 7.2mm

LAB062EC 16 x 22 in. bass drum

LAF016EC 16 x 16 in. floor tom

LAT013EC 11 x 13 in. rack tom

LAT012EC 10 x 12 in. rack tom

LAS614EC 6.5 x 14 in. metal snare drum

I just did a complete retune. since I have had a little experience now I think I did everything right.

I will start with the snare. I tuned it to where it really sounds fantastic. I am very pleased with the sound. It has an Evans G1 coated up top and the stock reso Ludwig down below.

It sounds great but I had to use the duct tape on the res side in between the head and snare wires because of the snare buzz. I don't know if it is because of the room dynamics or what but even the radio playing makes it buzz. So I had to aslo crank up on the snare wires to eliminate the buzz because it was terrible. Of course I lost the perfect sound with the tape and tightening it up but it was the only way I could get the Buzz to an acceptable level.

The toms: I have Evans EC2 clears with the Evans E-rings. The reso side has the stock Ludwig.

I got them tuned pretty decent. They deff resonate allot compared to how I had them before.

So Iam wondering a few things here
1. How big of a difference would it make in changing the stock reso heads to something else?

2. How do you determine what is just enough resonance as to too much?

The sound I want is a nice mellow rich deep sound. I got it somewhat deep and resonant but the attack seems a bit much and plasticly sounding.

My bass drum I have the Evans eq4 batter.

It sounds very very crisp and sharp with no "Thud"

Would changing the batter and the batter head change this?

If so what type of batter should I get a felt one or what?


Any advice comments ideas or whatever would be great

[pastor_bob]

LD, have you checked out Professor Sound's Drum Bible? There is a great tuning section there that will discuss how the tuning of the batter and resonant heads relate to the overall sound. You can google it, or go to Drum Bum's lessons, and click on "Tuning."

With the G1 coated on the snare, you should be getting a nice open sound. With the EC2's on the toms, you are getting a less open tone, with a stronger attack. If the attack on the toms is "plastic" sounding, I am wondering if you are tuned a little too low. You might try tuning the batter a bit higher, and dropping the pitch of the resonant head so that it's lower than the batter head (the Drum Tuning Bible can explain this if you're not sure what i'm talking about).

[Lil drummerboy71]

Pastor Bob,

Yes I have checked out the tunning Bible and followed their instructions as well as some other sites I saw that said the same thing.

The snare I am happy with. The snare does sound awesome except for that buzz and if i try and tune it any other way it sounds bad. So I dunno if it is the room or what.

The range on the toms seems very tight because I did experiment with all sorts of config on the heads. the way I have them now if I do go higher in pitch I begin to really start to crank up on the tension rods especialy on my 12" tom and then I really start lossing the resonance and it sounds terrible,

[Northern Redneck]

1st if you want more resonance get rid of the EC2s. Go with a single ply head with no internal muffling. Changing the stock resos will make a difference but nowhere near as big as getting rid of the EC2's.
For your kick it sounds like you have it tuned to high. bring the tuning down to a wrinkle and then using 1/4 turns bring your head up testing with your pedal after every adjustment. Bring your reso to just were the wrinkles disappear. Now using 1/8 turns just bring the reso up to were the plastic sound goes away.
If its still to ringy put a dampner in that way you'll have the same note but lose the ring.

[audiotech]

Well I am too having issues with excessive snare buzz or what's known as sympathetic vibrations being caused by my 10" rack tom and to a lesser degree my 8" rack tom.

First of all you will never get away from snare buzz a together. The main reasons for snare buzz are your rack toms probably are tuned too close to that of your snare, your snare wires are stretched or loose or you may have a problem with your snare bed. If it's not cut to the correct depth, the snare wires will not seat correctly on your snare head and the loose wires of the bunch will rattle excessively.

I just recently purchases my Yamaha Maple Absolute custom snare and are having the same problems you are.
I tried really tightening the snare head which helped, but I feel I need to get rid of the buzz a bit more. I re-tuned my 10" tom, you can either go above the problem frequencies by tuning the tom high, or go below the frequency of the snare drum by tuning your toms a bit lower. I took the lower course since I like to hear my drums thunder and resonate. The only problem with re-tuning one of your toms is now you gotta re-tune your other toms so that they all fall in correct pitch with one another.

I now got it pretty well managed. I'm going to try one more approach to the matter. I now have another excuse to go to my favorite drum shop and buy a set of Pruesound Equalizer snare wires. These wires are either 16, 14 or 12 strands wires with the center wires missing. So you have either 8, 7 or 6 wires on each side with the center wires gone. The people at Puresound feel that most of the sympathetic vibrations occur through these center wires.

This Yamaha snare is a fantastic sounding drum, but out of the four snare drums I have, this has been the most pain in the butt. BTW, I have already tried replacing both the snare and batter heads with no appreciable differences.

If this turns out to be the solution, I will post it here.

BTW, concerning the tuning of your toms, Work with both your batter and your reso heads when tuning. You won't have to crank them very much to achieve the sound you want and always make sure you drums end up in tune with themselves, this is very important to get that pure tone out of your drums. After a while it actually takes less time to completely loosen your tension rods and start over, rather than continuously fiddle with a drum that you have no idea where you are with the tensions. Start with just getting the wrinkles out of the head and slowly work up from there.

Good luck,
Dennis