2013: Your Year in Gear

[hairmetal-81]

As we approach the last month of the year, there's always the time for 'end-of-year review tv-shows'. I thought, why not have our own little 'vdrums-forum review-show?' I just checked, there are currently 138 users around - this will make for a brilliant thread!



What did you pick up?
What did you sell?






Of course, if you have a picture, we always love seeing those!
:wave:

[bwilburn79]

2013 has been my first year as a member here. A little back story: I bought my first drum kit in May of 2012, an Alesis DM-8 USB kit and began playing for the first time. My sole purpose was to become good enough to play in the newly formed praise and worship band at my church. Although I was terrible, I began playing in the church band in October of 2012, when the previous drummer accepted a staff position at another church. Those were interesting times to say the least. Then in December, I joined this forum. In January of this year, I decided to try my hand at DIY trigger pads for my Alesis kit.



After some successful Alesis builds, and upon gleaning from the amazing DIY crowd here, I decided to buy a Roland module and build a full kit. I purchased a TD-12 module, an MDS-12V rack, a set of VH-12 hats, a CY-13R, and two CY-12R/C to use as crashes. I also purchased, two 10" and one 12", Sonor Extreme Force toms. I split the shells and made a snare, a floor tom, and two rack toms with them. I made a kick from an old Ludwig snare, completing my first kit. Recently, my church was considering replacing an acoustic kit with an electronic kit, so I let them demo mine. After a test drive, they wanted to buy my kit. Made me feel good. The kit performed great, looked great, and saved my church a lot of money compared to buying stock Roland kits.



In April, I traded my Alesis kit for a Gretsch Blackhawk acoustic kit with cymbals and hardware. Currently I am refinishing the shells in a custom "Sunrise Burst" finish and will proceed to the electronic conversion when that process is complete.



I've already purchased the cake pans, electronic components, cable snake, and another TD-12 module to complete the conversion.

I love the look of clear acrylic. I had wanted to convert a Crush Acrylic kit but those babies are just too high ($$$$). Recently, fulrmr(Daniel) put up an amazing acrylic cymbal thread and the wheels have been spinning ever since. So there might be an acrylic cymbal project, as my first foray into DIY cymbals, on the horizon for 2014.

[Cheddies]

This is an easy one: this year I bought everything I have drums wise!

started the year kitless and have ended with the compact frankenkit.

Bought a used DTXPLORER kit in May, and since then have:
Built the 'tennis ball' drum riser (i live in an upstairs flat in West London)
Upgraded to 3 zone snare
Upgraded to dual zone PCY65s cymbals
Re-upgraded snare to Koby mesh head
Added an amp/monitor
Upgraded the Koby's mesh head to a Z-Ed triple-x
swapped the hihat pad for a roland cy pad

Then:
Upgraded module to td-11
Upgraded td-11 sounds to vexpression
Added a roland converted yamaha pcy150s 3 zone ride
swapped the kick for a krigg

and (hopefully) before the end of the year will have upgraded the snare to a dual zone 12" from thomman.de.

so yeah, been hit by a bit of GAS here and there.

[White_Pointer]

Let's see,

In 2013 I sold my four rubber PD-8's and mesh PDX-8, and replaced them with three mesh PD-85's and two mesh PDX-100's. I also sold my FD-8 and CY-5 combo and replaced them with a VH-11. Also picked up a padded snare case for transport of my V-cymbals.

That's about it I think. Not too shabby.

[barryabko]

It was a big year for my V-drum related purchases:
Roland TD-30
Roland VH-13
Roland CY-12C (2) Pintech - replacement heads, triggers, rim guards, etc.
Pintech 12" Concertcast pad - dual zone Pintech 10" Concertcast pads (2)
Alesis 14" three zone ride
Full eKit wiring Rack tubes and clamps
24" video monitor
Toshiba laptop

I also purchased a bunch of acoustic drum items.

[fulrmr(Daniel)]

I have no idea where to begin.................let's see............

Dissected the 21 piece Smokey Chrome Monster. Ditched/sold most of my Roland gear(except for the church kit..TDW-20 based) and went all 2Box and Gen16. Bought Clear Acrylic shells and MidiKnights Pro Lighting system. Rebuilt my DrumFrame Throne using a modified Roc-N-Soc seat.....Relpaced all my rack tubes with curved ones..including the uprights. Built a Direct Drive system and then a Drumagination Quad Steele pedal prototype from a Sleishman Twin Pedal. Built 4 DIY Acrylic splashes and 4 DIY Acrylic Chinas.....hmmm....I'm sure there is more...but that's all I can remember off the top of my head.

[Picksorsticks]

Nothing v-drum wise.....put did pick up a Cherry red Epiphone SG......picked that up before trying to get something going musically where I'm the drummer...doesn't that figure...

[Tommy_D]

Lots of stuff has come, not a lot has gone, but the year is not over. Still lots of stuff coming...

[jammin777]

i bought a 99 seadoo gsx rfi pwc. opps! wait you meant drums right? nevermind lol!

[Rushfan74]

I don't even know where to start.

[ItsMe]

Picked up this little Tama Silverstar 18" Bass three weeks ago converted it last week its sweet.....

[BWaj]

2013 has been my first year as a member here. A little back story: I bought my first drum kit in May of 2012, an Alesis DM-8 USB kit and began playing for the first time. My sole purpose was to become good enough to play in the newly formed praise and worship band at my church. Although I was terrible, I began playing in the church band in October of 2012, when the previous drummer accepted a staff position at another church. Those were interesting times to say the least. Then in December, I joined this forum. In January of this year, I decided to try my hand at DIY trigger pads for my Alesis kit.



After some successful Alesis builds, and upon gleaning from the amazing DIY crowd here, I decided to buy a Roland module and build a full kit. I purchased a TD-12 module, an MDS-12V rack, a set of VH-12 hats, a CY-13R, and two CY-12R/C to use as crashes. I also purchased, two 10" and one 12", Sonor Extreme Force toms. I split the shells and made a snare, a floor tom, and two rack toms with them. I made a kick from an old Ludwig snare, completing my first kit. Recently, my church was considering replacing an acoustic kit with an electronic kit, so I let them demo mine. After a test drive, they wanted to buy my kit. Made me feel good. The kit performed great, looked great, and saved my church a lot of money compared to buying stock Roland kits.



In April, I traded my Alesis kit for a Gretsch Blackhawk acoustic kit with cymbals and hardware. Currently I am refinishing the shells in a custom "Sunrise Burst" finish and will proceed to the electronic conversion when that process is complete.



I've already purchased the cake pans, electronic components, cable snake, and another TD-12 module to complete the conversion.

I love the look of clear acrylic. I had wanted to convert a Crush Acrylic kit but those babies are just too high ($$$$). Recently, fulrmr(Daniel) put up an amazing acrylic cymbal thread and the wheels have been spinning ever since. So there might be an acrylic cymbal project, as my first foray into DIY cymbals, on the horizon for 2014.

Freaking awesome!!!! Great job and a beautiful kit.

[BWaj]

Oops, did not mean to repost all those pics but it's a great kit, lol.

[BWaj]

For me, Gen 16's, 3 crashes and hats (which all sound great) and a ride which is slightly better sounding than the hubcap that fell off my 2005 minivan, split in half and rolled into a pond; was then salvaged by divers and then added to my kit. lol, don't buy the Gen's for the ride!

A TD30, my first ful on DYI drums from the shell up. 4 toms, snare and a kick. Couple of monitors, Studio One, and 37 evil glares from my wife along with her saying, thanks to you, the kids can't go to college!

In the process of learning how to build or use these new toys, I've lost 1,789 hairs, 12,314 of the others have turned grey, I've invented 13 new words, none of them are good. I've perfected telling my sons NO! YOU CAN"T UNPLUG IT BEFORE YOU TURN IT OFF!!!! I've told my wife not to touch my gear 11 times and as a result purchased 11 new pieces of jewelry in an attempt to say, I'm sorry.

My wife had to call the paramedics once to restart my heart when I did not realize I had the volume on my monitors maxed before I hit my snare. She also had to call the vet but thank God my dog pulled through.

But the greatest moment of my year in gear, was when my wife told me, if you buy one more piece of gear, I'm cramming it in your...

[bwilburn79]

I can't seem to post anywhere. So frustrating.

Thanks BWaj for your kind words in regard to my projects. However compliments won't excuse you from posting pictures of your DIY kit. Pictures or it didn't happen. lol.

fulrmr(Daniel), I knew you were working on an acrylic cymbal project and I even knew that LED lighting was incorporated, but I didn't know that acrylic shells were involved as well. Is this news to anyone else? When pray tell can we get a peek at this wonderment?

[fulrmr(Daniel)]

I have taken a new job and currently can only seem to stockpile parts. I haven't even seen my kit for months. It's mostly together and working in a "prototype" mode(as I have settled on it's final configuration) so I'm able to bash a bit as I pass by when I get a second or 2. Hopefully, in the coming months, a building/playing routine will reveal itself amongst the chaos and then I will complete the experiment and reveal the results. It will make a nice thread I believe.