That oval badge usually signify's made in Japan construction,but I have never seen one with USA on the badge.Please post more pictures if possible so more members can pipe in.There were definately some oddball hybrids between the USA and Japan era.American maple floor toms with Pearl legs and mounts,drums with Made in Japan scratched out,etc.

I looked closely at the C/L photo and I would need to check them out in person,as the pic's are blurry.But I'd lean towards MIJ's with a US snare.With the bottom heads off it will be easy to tell,as luan has vertical grain and maple is horizontal.

Thanks

You may be right US snare, Japanese Bass and tom shells.

I am going to try to get by and see them tomorrow.

Thanks for the tip about the grain that will be a quick tip off.

If the bass and tom are Japanese I'm thinking $300 is a bit high ?

I passed on a set of red sparkle Kent's at $200.00 a while back. Sometimes I'm glad I did, sometimes I'm not. They were kind of rough and rusty.

I'm no Kent expert, but I don't remember seeing that badge before. Please do post more pix if you can get them.

I thought I remembered reading that they put USA on the import kits for awhile (essentially lying) and then took the USA off at some point. Not 100% sure on that, but thats what comes to mind.

-Adam

Not necessarily lying.

My understanding is that, mid 60's or so they began to import the shells from Pearl(?), but they were still putting them together in NY.

I guess the way Toyotas are made in USA.

Late 60's they were just branding import kits.

Well, to be completely fair, even though the maple used on the American Kent drums was pretty nice, they had several less desirable qualities - the edges were notoriously bad and they employed some "unusual" construction techniques.

Say what you want about the wood used on old MIJ shells, but the edges, as they left the factory, usually had a decent contour and the interior ply seams weren't dripping with blackened glue.

Yea, but the early Kent drums were very, very good quality.

in the early 1950s, two employees of Gretsch resigned and opened the Kent Manufacturing Company here in Brooklyn, Ny.

Kent drums were made in a factory across the street from the Gretsch factories in Brooklyn (the building is still standing). They used maple shells and good quality hardware, but the plating process is where they cut corners to save money. Their chrome plating wasnt good at all and after a few years started to flake off. Gretsch, on the other hand, had some of the best plating in the business.

The shells tho, were pretty good. With calf heads they sound wonderful.

I was never thrilled with the early snare drums, but with a bit of work they can sound pretty good.

Sometime in the late 1960s they started importing shells from Japan (probably thru A%A imports in NY) and putting their hardware on them. Then, very late in the game, entire stencil sets which they rebadged with the Kent name. Thats when they really started to suck.

For some reason, they build a ton of the early sets in Orange sparkle. My guess is that their parts dealer finagled a great deal on orange sparkle which wasnt a popular color.....maybe Kent bought a ton of it at a huge discount, and thats why so many Kent sets have it.

Well, on the Kent snare I have (an American made one - maple) the wood grade is nice, but it has some bizarre coiled up construction. The edges are terrible, since the plies aren't even the same sized depth. This might not matter with a calf head, of course, but it does show that the QA was, uh, lacking.

The hardware is a mixed bag, too. The butt end could withstand a nuclear war, but the strainer's throw arm broke off (as I have seen on many of these.) The lugs, however, are solid as anything ever made.

I definitely find old Kent drums interesting, I just get a bit defensive when someone someone trashes the MIJ imports that arguably had a few better features than the American Kents.

LOL....You are 100% right about those snare throw-offs....the worst I ever saw. I dont know why they used that model, once again, my guess is because it was cheap for them to buy.

And yes, the lugs were solid as a rock.

Youre probably right about Quality Control at Kent being somewhat iffy.

My point is really that when you restore a Kent set from the 50s/early 60s, you end up with a really high quality drum set that sounds great.

When you restore a MIJ set, many times you still end up with....a cheap set.

The Luan stuff......UUGGGHHH. :)