Good deal!!

Cheers

As you get older you may come to appreciate the Luddy flat base stands.Vintage guys like them,you could probably get you 100 bux or close to it back by selling them.

Nice score,esp with the classic lugs.I have owned 5 ludwig kits and never had a classic lug fail on me.

Great deal ! Sorry to hear seller was an 455hat.. If there's any consolation,

he thought he was getting rid of junk, based on his "accurate' description of his Ludwig Standard kit,

will be missing out on more coinage, and you my lucky friend, have snagged a great kit at a steal...

100 bux?!!?!! I could cry. GREAT DEAL! Congrats.

-Doug

$400 would have been a reasonable deal, $100 is a steal. Congrats.

Got to take a bit more time on them. All of the drums have cracking in the wrap to some extent. They were covered with so much grime it was hard to tell. Also the cracks run horizontal with the pattern on the wrap. Nothing terrible ... 'players kit?' The 13 has the crack (looks to be repaired) and a crack in the rering. Bottom rims were held on by some type of weather stripping... or did somebody sell this stuff to drummers who did not want bottom heads? It is a bit goofey but holds the rims firmly in place. See pic. All the lugs and rods seem to work fine and be well lubed. Mounting hardware is straight and functional. No internal mufflers (I knew that when I bought them.) I had some 3/8" chrome rod and rubber feet on hand, so I made a couple spurs. After taking tons of filth off I threw some old mismatched clear single ply heads on the tops. They sound pretty good.... just like they should. I'm sure I'll find more when i get a chance to take them all the way apart for a cleaning.

What do you guys think 1968-69? That is the only catalog where I found Ruby Strata listed.

As I get older? LOL if you only knew how many feet I already have in the grave! I have some MIJ copies of that stand style and I even appreciate THOSE. Light weight, small and functional.

The stands were in a big filthy, mismatched pile. Misc tops and bottoms, etc. Some of what I thought was rust was just dirt. There looks like enough there for a couple full stands. I have yet to take some proper time on them. Just wiped off some grunge so I wouldn't drag it inside. Thanks for the heads up on the values of them.

If that rubber stripping was on there instead of the bottom rims that is interesting for sure ,and the first time I have seen it.Of course in the 70's people were going for the concert tom thing and removing the rims on the reso side,but that is the first I have seen as a solution to protect the bottom bearing edge,if that is the reasoning behind that.The other solution was to keep the bottom rims on and cut the center part of the head away as close as possible to the outside of the drum.

Ruby stayed available for as long as they made the Standards which seems to have been from approx. 1968-1972ish. I'd GUESS these were actually from the tail end of production due to the classic lugs which the factory may have used on sets at the tail end of the run when they knew they were going to be discontinued and therefore didn't want to stock any more of the smooth lugs but still had customer orders for drum sets to fill...but that's just a theory and maybe they were made sometime earlier and they were just low on the Standard lugs that week. Or maybe someone else changed the lugs out at some point in their life...but I doubt it as that would be an expensive endeavor without really improving the drums significantly or substantially increasing their value. But you never know.... Those lugs are probably considered to be a "plus" today so you're even luckier than you obviously already were.

Serial numbers might give some indication. Rick Gier has Standards included in his Ludwig dating guide. They used a different series of numbers than the other Ludwigs.

Thanks for the date info K.O. Yes, I'm lucky. I do look every day, so there is some diligence in with that luck. I think I've seen maybe a dozen vintage USA kits come up on craigslist in the greater part of Montana in the last 2-3 years. And I'm pretty sure one of those sets was my first set that I sold 20 years ago (attached picture of red sparkles.) I bought what I now know was a Standard set in a pawnshop for $220 in 1992ish (I remember the money better than the date because I was a poor college student. It was for the rehearsal space. I was the guitar player. I tried to buy THAT kit when it came back up. It was in really nice shape.

The guy sent me a text yesterday. ~'You were right. I did list the pedal with the set. Sorry about that. Come and pick it up.' The tension in the sale was probably because I thought he was trying to back out on what he said was included and he thought I was trying to get something for nothing. BTW: He was asking $100 and I gave him $100. So he gave me the Speed King and I gave him 2 pounds of honey from my bees as a thank-you for honoring his listing. (If anybody needs some Montana honey all proceeds go to keep the bees alive and support my drum addiction. LOL) A little forgiveness with honey on top.