Buying snares (the wires), or not?

[Vigilante]

Hi all, been a while since I had a question! Here's a simple one.

A friend of mine has a cheap-butt little snare that came with a cheap-butt little kit. The snare is some kind of cheap-butt pine or something. However, it's just for kids.
Anyhoo, the snare sounds horrible now, he wants to replace it, so for kicks, I asked if I could try to fix it instead. I first took off the batter head and tightened everything up, there was even a nut floating around in there! The internal dampener broke though, I removed it. Also the snare control hardware is busted. Oh well. The snares will have to be tightened solely by the adjusting screw, since the lever doesn't work.

My problem is the snare wires. I tightened it all up and it would sound passable if only the wires didn't buzz so much. If I put pressure on the two ends of the wires, the metal parts where the strap goes, and press down so the snares make harder contact with the head, it sounds OK. But without that pressure, it sounds like a buzzing POC.

I've now taken the snares off 3 or 4 times, I tried bending the metal to make better contact, bending the snares themselves, tweaking the whole thing a few times, to no avail. I even tried taping them down. It got a little better, but after bending things, not all the snares are perfectly lined up, so some buzz more then others, I have the same problem.

I've got two questions, then:
One, now I'm afraid if I had him buy new snares, none of them would make any better of contact. When I look at pictures of snares, the brackets at the end look the same, I can't tell if they press further down toward the head or not, I fear I'd have a similar problem of not making tight contact with the head. And note that it does not get tighter as I tighten the adjusting screw, it tightens the snares themselves, of course, but doesn't increase the pressure against the head.
Or two, should I maybe cut some of these snares off down to maybe 10 (it has 20) and then maybe the 10 will be easier to get functioning? I know some pro drummers will cut snares off for a snappier snap, I'd be willing to try it.

I have an extra Evans or Remo head around here that I can replace the batter side with, this one is generic no-name, but I'm just afraid about the buzzing snares. How can I increase the pressure against the head itself? And can I count on new snares to have better pressure in this regard?


Thanks

[Vigilante]

Come now, 42 of you don't have a suggestion?

I went ahead and cut the 20 snares down to just 8. And I STILL can't get them tight against the head! What gives?

If I reach down and apply some pressure to the brackets, it doesn't sound half-bad, but otherwise I just can't get them to make good contact. I'm afraid new snares would have the same problem.

??

[ausrock]

Chances are the shell itself was made somewhere in Asia from Luaun (sp) although it could be a cheap grade of Maple, regardless, it should be possible to get it sounding half decent.

First and most important things to check are the bearing edges and snare beds............:

1) Bearing edges (where the heads contact the shell)..........if you lay the shell on a (perfectly) flat surface the edges should contact all the way around. They should have a consistant profile to the edge itself.....it may be fairly sharp or it may be slightly rounded, it doesn't matter so long as it's even.

2) Snare Beds (a dip in the Bearing Edge on the resonant head side where the snare cords press down onto the edges)..........these must be profiled correctly and evenly as it is these beds that allow the snare to lay against the resonant head, if the beds are dodgy then it's unlikely that you will ever get a decent snare sound.

I suggest you have a look at the tutorial pages on Drum Foundry's site as it is all explained there, also, you should be able to purchase a replacement snare throwoff (strainer) from them........... http://www.drumfoundry.com

[nddhc]

Are you not able to get the snares as tight as you need them? Or are you getting them tight and it still doesnt sound good?

Im still learning about drum stuff...but..

Maybe the snare wires are just installed wrong. Mine are attached with some sort of twine and you can unscrew that to adjust the tension even more.... I hope I didnt lead you in the wrong direction though

[ausrock]

If, as Vigilante has said, the throw-off is broken, then he'll never have proper control of the snare tensions.

[Vigilante]

Thanks.

Ya the throw off is broken in the sense that you can't switch it to drop the snares. So it is permenently in the tight position, and then I use the adjusting screws to tighten the snare wires.

OK, so yes, I CAN make the wires tight, as tight as I need, but making them tighter does not seem to make them get better contact with the head.

The contact edge of the snare, that is the bracket that rests on the drum head, looks kinda messy to me. The snares are attached with a blob of solder that didn't seem all to carefully applied.

The dip, curve part of the snare bracket seems normal, if anything I jacked it up myself trying to get it to contact better.


I any case, it was an interresting experiment trying to fix the snare. Believe me, it is a $15 shell with .50 heads, I am almost certain the shell will likely be warped a bit, or the edges where the snare holding strips go through the head bracket is not leveled right.
So anyways, I've returned the drum, did the best I could. Sounds OK when the snares are dropped, but it sounds like poop otherwise, cause they vibrate so much instead of snapping.


Thanks, I'll keep everything in mind next time I go to try and fix a drum.

Peace