So here we have four accounts of why the rivets were used:

[LIST]

[*]fire marshall told them to

[*]Bill Ludwig told them to

[*]OSHA told them to

[*]Italian pearl wraps were not staying put

[/LIST]

Who knows? All I know is that I have had both silver sparkle and chrome riveted drums.

Most always... I let the membership enjoy the forum and stay out of most discussions, but this one, well... now I have to comment!

vinvibe!

Not sure where you heard that story.. ( and there could certainly be shards of truth within of course! ) .. but .. laws weren't even in effect regarding "fumes" and/or toxicity of the cements used to adhere wraps at this point in time. Also, water based cements weren't on the scene yet either during this period. It was indeed ALL solvent based contact cement. I toured the Ludwig Drum Company in 1975, and as I recall... they were quite on top of ventilation and fresh air exchange as we did see drums getting wrapped, as well as drum sticks being "turned" then sprayed with lacquer, but I digress. That said...

tillerva!

#2 and #4 of your assessment are correct! I chatted about this very issue with BIII ( Bill Ludwig III ) during one of our many discussions about Buddy Rich and his time spent at Ludwig during his THIRD endorsement period.. and beyond .. as Buddy continued playing Ludwig even after they had parted ways with regard to their business dealings/endorsement. The main culprit, and actual reason for the rivets was...

SHRINKING WRAP!! The "cure"... or so Ludwig thought, was to rivet the seams in conjuction with the solvent based contact cement that was still being used at the time. For the most part, it didn't work. The wrap still shrunk, and so much so that it PULLED right at the seams even with the rivets! So now we have wrap that not only has shrunk/pulled with open seams, but wrap with HOLES in it too! What a mess. On Buddy's last Ludwig set, one can clearly see the rivets on the bass drum wrap as that one comes up around and just above the spurs. Hideous. And it didn't work. This particular problem wasn't really fixed until the last few years actually. Finally... with the "new" wrap/material now available, the shrinking is gone... seams stay tight... and all of this WITH water based contact cement too! Or even tape if that is your favorite method. So...

That was the main reason for the rivets on Ludwig drums during this era!

Tommyp

Sounds like Tommy is right on in my opinion. My first set of drumswas/is a Gretsch set I got in 1983 at 12 years old. I had always wanted Ludwig though as my favorite players played them. Alex Van halen, Ringo, Bonham, my teacher Etc...

After my senior year of high school in the summer of 1990 I finally ordered my first full Ludwig set. I had always Loved Buddy Rich too so I went with a 22,12,16,18 wmp kind of Buddy Rich look. I was disappointed when the set came with solid black hoops on the bass drum and withing six months, the wrap had shrunk, peeled and split in multiple places. I was pretty annoyed and the warrenty took care of a new re-wrap from Ludwig only to have the same issue happen again. When they agreed to wrap a third time I was told that WMP as well as any other cool sparkle or pearl finish was removed from the catalog. I ended up getting a fake walnut finish and that craked as well! I finally ended up selling the kit and by this time anyway I was totally into vintage Ludwigs.

Ot wasn't until the 2000's that I saw a new Ludwig set and they had improved the wraps and the color choices. I have has several new sets since 2003 and all have been great. I recently bought a new set last year in champagne sparkle and they now use the "wrap tite" process. Supposedly the wrap can never come apart. It's been almost a year and so far the set has been great!

It sounds like they really had a rough time with the wraps in the 80's and 90's. I think in the 60's they just used super strong glues and nobody cared...

No wonder I get so "high" when playing my Ludwigs. And all this time I thought it was the 3 ply shell construction ...

I would think that a metal wrap will never "shrink" because it doesn't.

I believe it's the wood that is changing dimensions beneath the wrap.

HowlerMonkey!

You are of course correct, but then again... no one ever said that the COW wraps "shrunk". This discussion was primarily about Ludwig's pearl wraps. What was mentioned was that someone saw Eric Carr of KISS at a concert and could plainly see the rivets holding the chrome wrap on his Ludwig's. I would imagine that once Ludwig was using rivets as "the method" for the time, ALL sets got the treatment regardless of the wrap used!

Tommyp

LOL.....I probably had multiple windows open and responded here to an older thread.

That said, I do have two 24 inch bass drums in chrome over wood, six ply.........

1858043 no rivits and with top mount for toms

3060804 with rivits but virgin