Thursday, March 29

I sanded the sand and sealer down level, then cleaned the dust off using naptha. Tomorrow's plan is to brush on another 2 coats of nitro sand and sealer, let it cure over night and level that on Saturday morning.

For this project I need the sand and sealer on first to seal any grain pits, and to get a very level surface for the primer coat. Since I'm painting the drum, the level primer coat is a must, so you don't see any pits in the final paint. The clear coat will only magnify and defects, so getting them out from the start is a must.

Wednesday, March 28

I wiped the exterior of the drum down with naptha, to remove any oils and contaminants, and let it dry about 20 minutes. Brushed on 2 coats of nitrocellulose sand and sealer. I waited 1 hour in between coats. Then I boxed up the drum and will let it cure over night.

Monday, March 26

Big day for getting things accomplished. I sanded the wood filler level in the chipped area, cleaned the dust off and now it's time to start covering anything that I don't want painted.

I marked 1/8" lines on some blue tape. This 1/8" gap is what is want over the bearing edge of the drum. I could have 'eyeballed' this, but I like to be as perfect as I can get and in reality, this only took an extra 5 minutes of my time.

Next I used my shop light to case a shadow on the tape. This made finding that 1/8" line easier and I just worked my way around the drum on both sides. I also put backing tape over all the holes on the interior of the drum. Later I will be filling the holes with putty so they won't get any sealer, paint or clear coat in them.

All finished with the bearing edges. Next up covering the interior of the drum.

Here is the drum all covered to protect it from any over spray. You don't want any paint or clear coat the inside of the drum. This will 'choke' the natural wood sound if you do. Of course you can do what ever you really want, but this theory was explained to me and it makes sense, so I stick with it.

Lastly, I filled in all the holes with Plumber's Putty. I love this stuff, it never stains and never hardens. The pic here is after I have all the putty scraped level, so it's flush with the drum surface.

Sunday, March 25

I disassembled the drum and started sanding the surface for a sand and sealer coat. But, I noticed a chip near one of the lug holes. I repaired the chip, but the filler will have to dry overnight before I can sand it level, and finish sanding.

Saturday, March 24

Drilled out the lug holes in the afternoon. Then I had diner with my sister and after diner, Doug and I headed to the basement to work on the drum. Doug helped me with the layout of the strainer and butt plate and exactly where the vent hole was to go. Everything went as smoothly as it can get when drilling with a hand drill, so a few "widening" of holes was required, naturally, to fit every thing. Doug also taught me how to cut the snare beds into a snare drum, but I left the actual cutting to him. Thanks Doug for all your help.

We also assembled the drum completely and Doug tuned it up so we could hear what it would sound like and to also make sure everything was in proper working order.

The actual picture was taken as I had already started to disassemble the drum, (if there are any drummers out there, you'll notice a tension rod is missing). But I thought I'd get the pic of the assembled drum in it's "mock up" phase before it was too late.

Tuesday, March 20

I laid out the lug mounting holes and center lines for the strainer, butt plate, and vent hole. I did this using a template I drew up in AutoCAD at work.

Monday, March 19

The parts officially arrived today (these took two weeks to arrive). Over the past 2 weeks, I've finalized and tested the paint and tribal stripe material on a test piece of wood. I unpacked all the parts and impressively all the parts were actually there. The wood shell looks so good that it's almost a shame to paint it.

Design Process

The design and research process took about 3 week total to complete. It was a rough 3 weeks, but thanks to Doug (my drummer expert and just so happens to be my brother-in-law) help sort out the details on the drum parts for me. All I had to do was find the suppliers and find the one that I could get everything I needed at the lowest price. The paint and extras were still up to me, but I sorted through them like a champ. (From here all the posts will have the date I did things in the title.)

The New Drum

It's been started ... the new snare drum making process. I'll start playing catch-up here for the next few weeks and I'll just start posting per what I've done on each day that it was completed (so dates posted and dates that will be in the title will be different most of the time.)

Stay tuned for pictures of all the progress. Until next post ... (which means when I get a slow day at work)