Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

I found these on my local classifieds and got them home today. The rare Slingerland copper plated steel over 3 ply shells.

24" and 26" bass drums
16" and 20" floor toms
13/14/15" rack toms
6.5 x 14" snare

It also came with 2 MIT toms that are recovered to match somehow. I would really love to know where he found wrap that matches so well.

The good - the copper wrap is still in good shape compared to most I've seen online. Lots of little spots of black/green oxidation, lots of little dings. But they're stamped 73, so they are turning 50 this year. All the original stick-saver hoops are here, and all the lugs/hoops are in very good shape. Not much pitting or flaking anywhere.

The bad - Previous owner drilled extra holes in all the toms for Pearl mounts - luckily, I believe the original Sling mounts will cover the extra holes. The 26" also has extra holes drilled in the top for a different tom holder. I believe another original Sling tom holder mount will cover it well.

He did include buckets of extra hardware, so I'm hopeful the original mounts are all here and accounted for. Haven't had time to unload and inspect all the hardware that came with them.

Looking for advice from the experts. I intend to completely disassemble each drum for cleaning and polishing. Right now my plan is to only use Windex or something weak and fast-evaporating to clean the shells. It would be good to protect them and shine them up without risking further damage to the finish. Maybe something like Pledge? Anyone got advice?

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

A couple more pics

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

Nice!!! You should be able to remove the tarnish. There was a guy on the old donor forum who cleaned up an HLD 590 with copper hardware and he removed the tarnish, but I do not remember his process....

I would replace the lugs on the 2 small toms with Slingy lugs to match the rest.....

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

My understanding is that the tarnish appears on these copper sets because the very thin copper cladding is actually gone. I could be wrong, and a search for a definitive answer for this on VDF was fruitless (well, actually I looked at the first 230 responses of a search for “copper cleaning” and gave up before reading the next 270 responses). They are still very cool looking drums and true icons of the era.

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

Correct. It is NOT copper sheet. It is a very thin layer of copper on a steel sheet with a clear coat on the copper to keep it from oxidizing. Anything other than a very light cleaning will remove whatever clear coat is left. Any type of abrasive cleaning/polishing will also remove the thin copper layer and expose gray steel. The black marks are corrosion on the steel.

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

DrumOgre, is it possible to post some serial numbers for these drums?

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

Sure thing! I'll make note of them for you next time I'm near the kit

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

This is my understanding as well. Any attempt to remove the black spots will only weaken the copper plating further. I will likely stick with windex, and maybe a very light application of piano polish to protect the lacquer.

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

Quite a mixed bag:

24" 88835
26" 160758
Snare 92460
13" 468279
14" 95420
15" 94975
16" 138118
20" 87641

Re: Slingerland Copper Over Wood - Just came home with me
 

Looks like they added the 26, 13 and 16 later on. So originally, 24 BD, the snare, and the 14, 15 and 20. Big boy drum set that got bigger. As I stated before, a very cool time-capsule and huuuuge drums. Bring the thunder, DrumOgre! Bring the thunder.