Selling Vintage Drums

[MikeJtone]

I am looking for some advice on how to raise some money by selling a vintage drum set to pay for another set that I bought. I currently own a mid to late 1960's Ludwig Classic drum set in Champagne Sparkle. It is in the Hollywood configuration (based on the info I got off of Clayton Greene scanned library). 22"-16"-13"-12" with an older style separate double tom stand. Bass Drum has only a mount for a L arm Cymbal Holder - no L arm. I have a snare that I bought separately in matching color, it is a pre-serial number keystone badge, red felt muffler, nickel (I think), Pioneer (I think) snare that is all original, including the heads. The Hi Hat, Cymbal stand & Bass Drum Pedal are add ons. The drums are nice but the floor tom & the 13" has inch marks in the wrap. These are not museum quality drums for sure, but they are overall nice drums.

Here is my question/dilemma - what is the best way to sell these drums to maximize the money I get. Sell it together as a kit (not totally complete). Or piece out each unit?

[MikeJtone]

Here are a couple more pictures to evaluate, you can see the marks on the floor tom. I thought that I could get somewhere around $800 maybe as much as $1,000. The serial numbers on the badges are 12"- 234753, 13" - 348856, floor -348581, bass drum - at my friends house.

[sabshga]

Look on eBay for completed auctions under advanced search. You'll get an idea of pricing and shipping costs. You can get the whole set in 1 box if you take off one head each and nest the drums. It is a very nice looking set and you should be able to get a good price for them. You can also sell them on consignment at some music stores but that usually means a 20% fee.

Regards,

Gary
Dix Hills, NY

[MikeJtone]

Gary, Thank you for the reply - I would definitely EBAY them, and based on your answer, I take it that you would think it is better to sell them together as a set rather than individually. Would you say that is right?

Thanks Mike L

[MikeJtone]

Gary,
I guess I got the answer by scanning the posts on one of the other forums, there is quite a discussion on the unkind practice of breaking up a set. I won't break up my Ludwig family, hopefully they will go to a good home and pay the rent for the new Rogers family that I have adopted. So much for social services & friend of the court!
Thanks for the response. Mike

[sabshga]

I wish I had room for another kit. Yours looks sharp. What are you replacing it with? Ludwig has reissued a champagne 4 piece classic set that I've heard is doing well. Same as yours minus the 12". So there will definitely be a bid for your kit.

[MikeJtone]

Gary,
Thanks, I bought a what I think is a late 60's or early 70's vintage Rogers drumset off of Ebay, what I hope is an early Fullerton Rogers Holiday drum set in the same sizes 22-16-13-12, minus the snare in gold sparkle finish. The seller told me that the drums all had paper tags with that read
Holiday , Fullerton, CA. The floor tom had a s/n 23100 & the 12" had 24108. He did not want to dis assemble the heads to check the other drums. But he said that all had the tags and were grey speckled interiors. I paid $610 for the drums.



I am not sure if I made a mistake, but, now I am committed. So it gives me a project to work on. I really like the sparkle wraps (not from a collector/value point of view, but I just think that wrap looks cool). And I like the Champagne Sparkle, Gold Sparkle & Silver Sparkle in particular, although the Green Glitter would really stand out for sure too.

I can't wait now to get the drums to find out exactly what I got. And start looking for stuff to complete the kit. The drums look real nice and have a vintage look like the Ludwigs, which I really do like, but I can only keep 1 of these kits, so I guess I am going to part with the Ludwigs to take on the new challenge of the Rogers.

I bought the Ludwig drums together with the tom stand 3 years ago from Back Beat Drums in Idaho for $800. I added the snare for $250 from an Ebay auction and pretty much got most of the pieces in place for a Ludwig Hollywood kit. It is fun to be on a project and rewarding to put one together. So now I will try to do the same with Rogers.

I will make mention of the auction here when I put in up on Ebay, I generally put in a Buy It NOw price that is a good deal for me and for the buyer. Unfortunately, I have to sell the kit, to finance the other.

I'll follow up with a post, but in the meantime if anyone can identify the name of the drumset that I did end up buying, I would love to know, see pics below.

[Tommyp]

Hey Mike...

These look like the "Dave Clark Londoner" model, with the addition of a 22" bass drum in place of the cataloged 20", and missing the Powertone snare drum. ( the COB Dynasonic was available as an option on this model ) This was the only 5 piece configuration that Rogers cataloged... and the kit continued into the 70's, but without the Dave Clark name. It was then known simply as the "Londoner V".

Tommyp

[MikeJtone]

Tommy,
Thanks, I was going to hit you up with that question, but you already took care of it...I did see that kit illustrated in the Rogers Book and thought that it was the same, until I noticed the 20" BD. But this makes me feel good about what I bought, that I can at least identify and place it in context.

Do you have enough information to put an approximate year on this set? I did send an email about a COB Dyna Sonic Snare that I found/bought for this kit dated around 1970.

I had a question about the Dyna Sonic 6 1/2 inch shell vs the standard 5 inch shell. What is the pro/con between the 2. I, for some reason, am wanting to get a Big R 6 1/2 inch Dyna Sonic for that 1976 Londoner kit. I have it in my mind that they better or more difficult to find or have a bigger sound. Any comments from anyone on this question?

Many thanks for all the help too.

Mike

[sabshga]

I'll let a Rogers expert talk about the relative value between sizes. For 6 1/2 vs 5 in general: deeper drums sound deeper. You should go into the local store and take a couple of snares in the drum room and try them out. I am pretty much a 5x14 guy. I don't like the real shallow ones (3 1/2), the ratio of tone to snare is not where I like it.

Going in the other direction, a deeper drum will give you more tone in the mix. Some say you give up snare response and I guess you must to some extent but I don't think it is to a level that is obtrusive. It really depends on the drum. Sometimes I use a field drum (10x14) as my main snare becuase the sound is so unique and the snare response is definitely good enough. I do think a drum like that has to be struck harder to get to the sweet spot in terms of optimal back beat sound, so I would not bring it to a dinner party. But rock/bar gig, heck, why not?

I do a lot of second line as well as funk and rock all in the same setting and the 5 works for me. I'm a bit set in my ways, but I don't think a 6 1/2 is going to present any problems in most playing situations.

So try some out to see what you like and go for it.

The new kit is very nice by the way and the guys on this site rave about Rogers. I have a couple of Rogers snares en route and I've never played one before.

Gary
Dix Hills, NY

[Tommyp]

Hey Mike/Gary...

Gary has done a fine job describing the relative difference in sound between a 5 and a 61/2 deep drum... not really much to add there! In the case of the Dynasonic:

A "Big R" COB Dynasonic in the 61/2X14 size would go very well with your 70's "Londoner V" kit. That kit, is in essence, Rogers 5 piece Rock and Roll model, which would be great with the deeper Dynasonic. However... ( isn't there always a however?! ) ...

The 61/2X14 Dynasonic is going to be harder to find... even in the "Big R" series, and they did build MORE of these during the 70's. They are out there though. I've seen more than a few come up on eBay... and ... a lot of times they aren't paid all that much attention. So, at times, you can walk off with one and not be in too much pain! :-)

Tommyp

[MikeJtone]

Thank you Tommy & Gary, I feel very fortunate to have such an opportunity to get advice and counsel from people who have such experience and knowledge. I love this forum!

Mike

[MikeJtone]

Gary, I just finished preparing my auction for the Ludwigs, it goes Live tomorrow/today Thursday OCT 12th @ 9:30pm eastern. This is the link you can access once it is LIVE.


Thanks for your help and advice.
Mike L

[sabshga]

You got lifted an hour after you posted. I told you, you should have done the buy it now higher. Anyhow, at least you got your money back. Congrats.

[MikeJtone]

Gary,
Next time I go to sell a drum set I am going to make sure I put a more realistic shipping. I paid $180 to ship the set via UPS! Wow that was an unpleasant surprise. But I am still happy, I got that Rogers kit coming, and I picked up a Dyna Sonic COB that dates to the set closely 1970, and I got that for a bargain @ $275, everything's there and original, and very nice, just got it at the house today - so that kind of balances the other out.

I spent so much time setting up shots of that Ludwig drum set and it really looked nice in the pictures, I kind of wanted to keep it. Live and Learn.

Mike

[Rich K.]

$170 sounds like a lot to ship a set. Did you go to a UPS store? They usually mark up shipping quite a bit...

[MikeJtone]

Rich,
Yes I did go through the UPS store, but used my own packaging. I had 4 boxes that I packed them in - one for the stands & hardware and 3 for the drums & hoops & heads; each box weighed 13 - 25 -28 -40 lbs, going from Michigan to California. USPS would have been cheaper except for the biggest box that weighed 40lb would cost $133 alone vs. $64 @ the UPS, because it was over sized. So I decided to send them all through UPS. I probably could have gotten the snare in with the box with the Bass & 13", but ended up putting that separate, otherwise my total would have been $140 for 3 boxes. It was a surprise. But now that it's done, I am looking forward to getting the Rogers kit. Next time I will be more prepared.
Mike

[Rich K.]

I didn't consider the stands...they can be heavy...UPS store do mark up shipping. If you pack it yourself, you can call UPS a day ahead and they'll pick up and it will be cheaper than going to a UPS store. I've heard Fedex ground is a bit cheaper...