I've been working off my phone for the past couple of days (home internet was down) so it's hard to see much of anything.

I wonder who asked for something like that first? Ed was coming off a Pearl endorsement but as I recall his Pearl sets had the older style "swivo-knock-off" style mounts. I just don't see Ludwig saying "Hey try this out" (although who knows?). Seems more likely a "I want this" situation with Ludwig figuring out a seemingly stop gap solution with parts they had on hand.

Thanks for all the info Tommy. I have talked with Joe before as well and he is a cool guy. I also had a great friend that was much older than me that I knew since high school. He was a huge jazz fan and saw Buddy numerous times and had great stories. He actually saw Buddy at Lennies one time in the early 70's and after about the second or third tune when one of the sax players was cranking out a solo an audience member screamed out "Omg! It's the illigitimate song of Charlie Parker!". I guess Buddy stopped the band mid song, walked up to the front of the stage and said "Ok folks... Show is over!". He then walked off stage and the band followed. My friend(as well as the rest of the crowd) just sat there for about 5 or 10 minutes until they realized that he was indeed gone for good. My friend told me that as he was leaving the place the manager(who was a woman) was fumbling the keys to her locked office door and screaming "Oh no you don't Mr Buddy Rich! You get your ass back up there!". I guess it was quite a sight to see this woman mad as hell screaming about Buddy.

I have also heard that glue changed around 1970 which is why you see a lot of Ludwig sets with lifting seams. I am pretty sure Ludwig has the wrap issue licked at this point but it certainly does make me wonder. It's impossible to know until something actually happens. I do know that the UV protection thing works. My set originally was ordered as a 22,13,16 5x14 and canister in champagne sparkle. Around 2015 and 200 shows later from everywhere to outside in the sun and under stage lights, I decided to order a 14x14. I was a tad worried that the colors would not match even though I knew about the UV thing. Again it was a situation of you won't really know until a certain amount of time has passed. When I got the 14x14 it was a dead on perfect match and I have very little doubt that these will ever fade. I certainly wish the old wraps were made with that luxury. Imagaine how many cool looking psych red sets would still be out there unfaded after all this time?

Kevin, wasn't BIII the guy that had to deal with BR? I seem to recall dealing with BR being a job that was given to BIII as BI and BII had their years of headaches dealing with Buddy. It makes me wonder if Buddy asked BIII about a more sturdy mount to use and BIII suggested the new modular mount. This might be an interesting question to ask BIII?

Kurt!

I've chatted with BIII more than a few times about this! Too much to go into here, but ... I know BIII was THE artist liason. He did have dealings with Buddy, but mostly just for his drumsticks! His father, Bill Jr., handled Buddy during his last go round with Ludwig from 1978 to 1980 ... as I recall anyway. BIII DID tell me some stories though! :)

Tommyp

Hey everyone,

Question: I heard that when he was with Ludwig, Buddy has his drums custom altered- mainly he had Ludwig build his drums from 3-ply shells, but without the solid maple reinforcing rings... any "truth" to that? Do the Maxwell drums have the re-rings?

nittanyperc!

Can't say that I have ever seen or heard that with regard to Buddy's last Ludwig endorsement built drums. I have seen/heard that his drums were "off the rack", as he used to say. That wasn't always the case of course, but with this endorsement it seems that it was. That all said, a 3 ply shell with no rings would have very little in the way of shell integrity as that is a very "thin" shell. The reinforcing rings do just that!, and especially so with just three plies. Regarding the Steve Maxwell distributed Ludwig Buddy Rich Centennial set: The shells are built on the Ludwig Classic Maple shell, so they are 7 plies, no rings, clear interiors. At 7 plies rings would not really be needed .. but .. could still be used if that was used in the design!

Tommyp

I assume that the reason Steve went with the CM shells (assuming he is the instigator of these sets, which I think is a pretty safe assumption) rather than Legacy shells is because the drums Buddy used in the late 70's/early 80's were themselves the typical 6 ply construction of the time. Of course the CM shells are all maple and the original 6 ply shells were maple/poplar but the CM would be the closest "off the shelf" currently made match and also more or less look the same as the 6 ply shells.

Yeah,

I was in a conversation with a guy who claimed to be one of Buddy's "chart readers".... and that Buddy gifted him one of his kits and to tell an "actual" Buddy kit was he told them to remove the re-rings. I think the late(r) 3-plys were Maple/Poplar/Maple, so that would be stronger, but then again, alot of drummers are (shall we say) ignorant in the ways of drum making and drum building, so he might not have known that Ludwig changed their shell configuration in response to Marshall stacks.

Ludwig phased out the 3 ply shells at right around the same time as Buddy came back aboard. The 3 ply shell was made by taking a flat 3 ply board ( a layup consisting of a single fat ply of poplar sandwiched between two much thinner plies of mahogany and/or maple) and bending it into a cylinder with a wide scarf joint for the glue at the seam. The re-rings are pretty much a necessity for such a shell to hold it's shape as the board wants to go back to being flat. Around 1977-78 Ludwig adopted a six ply design that was similar to what Gretsch had been doing for about 20 years prior. Those shells were made in a completely different way with the individual thin plies being molded and glued together into a shell with staggered seams (instead of one big seam where all three plies met) and some plies with opposing grains. This type of construction will hold it's shape without re-rings and is what nearly all drum manufacturers use today.

While Buddy would certainly be worth doing some customizing for (and his tom holder seems to be just that sort of thing) the 3 ply shells simply would not work well without the re-rings (nor would have the shells of the Slingerlands and Rogers drums Buddy had used prior). Also it kind of defeats the purpose of having a major endorser if he is playing drums you don't actually sell. If word of that gets out it would be embarrassing to say the least. Ludwig did make a 4 ply shell in the early 80's that they called the Super Classic and they also lacked re-rings since they shared the same sort of staggered ply construction as the 6 ply models. I don't know if Buddy used any 4 ply sets but it's certainly possible, given the number of sets he seemed to use, whether his own touring sets or ones provided for TV shows and such. Either way it is correct that these drums lacked re-rings but I think your guy may have been confused as to the number of plies.

If anything I'd have expected Buddy to prefer having the re-rings that had featured prominently in all the shell designs of the drums he had been using since the 1930's (and went back to with his final set of Radio Kings). Other than Gretsch (which Buddy seems to have avoided using for some reason) that ringless design was somewhat newfangled technology for most American made drums at that time.