On drums...

... ... where am I? Oh, right!



Bloody hell. Now that I have been playing the snare at it's current pitch, I have come to relish the sound. Only way it could be better would be deeper Poughf in the center, but not all things are forthcoming.

The way I read it, as wires are added, there will be less resonance, which would allow tuning the snare lower without incurring ringing in the center; but it would also remove the timbale effect from the edges, which I depend on. There would also be more snare activity, but I don't hear the need, and it would seem that the greater activity comes at a cost of more "extra" noise.

Another detail: the snare is tuned about a third above the 12, which puts it midway between the 8 and 12. I like it there, regardless that it is on the high side of what I am used to. As the tuning descends (maintaining the structure of 10 points of separation), the snare begins to lose distinction from the rest of the kit, whereas at current tuning, it has a very distinct tone while fitting into the overall character.

Yet another detail: Either there is a huge difference in the feel of the throwoffs, one to another, or else the 16 wire exerts much less pressure on the mechanism than Sonor's stock 24 wire... which I suppose it must, differences not withstanding. The same throw on the 6.5 is twice as hard to activate. The throw on the 8 feels as I would have thought it should.

And no, I'm not going to switch wires out. There's things like string and stuff. But I might buy a 20 strand Puresound to play with. If nothing else, I'd like to remove the 24 strainer from the 6.5.

Of course, everything might change when an actual gig shows up!

_________________
Gregory

Step #2

Removed the Puresound wires and stole the Sonor 24 wire set from the Classix. Mounted Sonor wires on the Designer and tuned it up and down; wasn't attracted to the sound.

Three main differences:

24 strand damps the drum excessively
too much "extra" racket in the wires at corresponding tension
overall sound is softer, I assume because of the softer metal content.

I then cut the middle eight wires out of the Sonor strand:

drum can now be tuned up or down and still retain the differential on-center to off-center character
very full sound... more drum, less "wire"
wires need very little tension to stop chatter
mellower than Puresound (which has a high strung brittle quality, yet is more articulate than stock

Apparently Sonor manufactures just such a wire set (Snare Wire 14" SW 1416/2 S), but its price is set at a cool hundred bucks. I would like to pay them not to add eight wires, but that seems excessive. Took about ten minutes to remove. Oh, the Sonor item comes in a wood box! ...

By the by, the throwoff feels the same with Puresound, Sonor stock and Sonor modified, so there is considerable variation in throwoff feel. Is there something inside that can be lubed or adjusted?

_________________
Gregory

_________________
Gregory

Haha...yeah that stops the whole production line. "Crap....we have to remove some ".

Sonor wires can be hung with string or with strap. Is there a school of thought for either? I assume the strap is less likely to break, but other than that...

_________________
Gregory

_________________
Cliff

River City Trio

What if we did all have the same opinions?

That was a long time ago and I don't remember writing it . But if I understand myself, then yes, the wire count made little difference. I do recall, probably at a later date, spreading a little lubrication in one of my Designer era throw-offs, and after that the throw-offs felt the same.

I've often wondered at the lever designs for throw-offs. My conclusion - made with no backing information - was that the longer levers were discarded because of the amount of motion required. As much as I love the extended strainer of my Lite snare for its sensitivity, turning the snare on mid-song feels like climbing down off the locomotive to change a switch. No simple flick will do it.

_________________
Gregory

Snarewires are, I think, more important than I've ever been willing to find out.
I would think they would have the potential to make a great snare amazing and a rough snare acceptable.
It just seems like it would be an ungodly amount of work; researching, buying, setting up.
One of those things I've always been too lazy to do but suspect it would be worth it.

I never really know what material mine are but seems I mostly deal with the Sonor 24's.
If not, I get a 24 so I can cut some strands out of the middle.
Once I tried one of those super fat ones, like 48 strands, and cut a lot of the middle out.
Don't remember how I felt about it. It was probably 100 snares ago and I probably didn't have it long.

So, someone here, please continue to do the work and tell me which material I want.

I've bought some used snares that came with 40-strand snares on them. Never liked them. All "snare" sound and no pop/drum sound.

I think on some of those 8" depth snares that some of you play, a wider/larger amount of snares might work OK. But I think 24 would be sufficient.

- D.