Thinking of a Reference Pure kit

[notoriousRJD]

Well, I am lucky enough to have a great drum shop very close to me so I have had a chance to see all of these up close and right next to every other brand. The quality of detail on these are fantastic.

[notoriousRJD]

Funny, I just watched that Anderton's video last night and that is a pretty killer finish.

[Drumming-4-Life]

I picked up a RFP a couple months ago. It's a nice kit. Its the only kit I own that actually sounds good with coated G2's on it. I think the varying wood combinations along with the sharp edges on the small toms and the fat round-overs on the floors make for a very nice balance of singing toms with thunderous floor toms.

Build quality is very nice. The finished interiors are a nice touch, though I wish they would have finished the edges as well. Tuning the rack toms is a bit tough because the optimounts have such a tight grip on the tension rods that you cant get the head seated and hand tightened first. It just takes a little bit more time to get the tension equal. Floor toms and bass tune up real easy. Overall, build quality is on par with other high end kits (DW Collectors, Yamaha Recording Custom, etc).

I have the 1030 tom arms and they are cool, but they are really expensive. I also wish the memory locks would fit in to the Optimount housing after you have tightened the mount to the pipe, but alas they don't. So you get to play a little game of "get the tom in place, hold it there, slide the memory lock in position, tighten it down, then tighten the optimount, check to make sure its still good, and repeat the process if more adjustments are required." Its little things like this that can be annoying. Once its all in place things are fine, but because the tom arm's movement is independent of the tom's rotation on the arm, you need to have everything loose to get full adjustment of the tom's position. This is just a comment on Pearl's tom mounting system and not a RFP specific comment.

EDIT: If I had a choice on a wrapped finish, I would try to get the Ice Blue Oyster finish. Such a pretty color:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1L3T...dertonsMusicCo.

Read this article, by the legend himself. You can adjust the Optimounts to maximize resonance.

https://www.pearldrummersforum.com/s...y-Gene-Okamoto

Well, I am lucky enough to have a great drum shop very close to me so I have had a chance to see all of these up close and right next to every other brand. The quality of detail on these are fantastic.

What were some of the other brands you got to play?

[notoriousRJD]

"Play" is probably overstating it...what I like to do is at least compare a single tom (in my case I am partial to 10" toms). So I sampled the 10" tom of Pearl (both Reference and Masters), DW (Performance and Collectors), Sonor, Ludwig (Classic and Keystone X), Yamaha and Gretsch. All slight variations but all good. However, like I said in one of the initial posts, something about the look of the Pearl kits kept drawing me in. I had also been at a clinic at this same drum shop a few weeks back and me and another person waiting for the clinic to start struck up a conversation about how nice the Pearl finishes were and how underrated we thought the Pearl Sensitone snares were (I, for one LOVE, my bronze sensitone).

Anyway, I have been really drawn towards these Pearl kits and love that I am coming somewhat full circle as my first kit was Pearl (I still have it). More recently I have been playing a Natal Ash kit, 1up 2 down.

[Drumming-4-Life]

"Play" is probably overstating it...what I like to do is at least compare a single tom (in my case I am partial to 10" toms). So I sampled the 10" tom of Pearl (both Reference and Masters), DW (Performance and Collectors), Sonor, Ludwig (Classic and Keystone X), Yamaha and Gretsch. All slight variations but all good. However, like I said in one of the initial posts, something about the look of the Pearl kits kept drawing me in. I had also been at a clinic at this same drum shop a few weeks back and me and another person waiting for the clinic to start struck up a conversation about how nice the Pearl finishes were and how underrated we thought the Pearl Sensitone snares were (I, for one LOVE, my bronze sensitone).

Anyway, I have been really drawn towards these Pearl kits and love that I am coming somewhat full circle as my first kit was Pearl (I still have it). More recently I have been playing a Natal Ash kit, 1up 2 down.

No Tama kits at your drum shop? Which line of Sonor did you check out?

[Tommy_D]

Read this article, by the legend himself. You can adjust the Optimounts to maximize resonance.

https://www.pearldrummersforum.com/s...y-Gene-Okamoto

Yeah, I checked that one out when I stripped the shells , cleaned/polished them all and put them back together. I don't think I have any resonance issues with them set up as described in the other thread, but I still need to do some final tuning on the drums and that may require some tweaking. My Recording Customs were like that. Tune them close, put them on the mount, then final tune them to get the resonance to come back.

[notoriousRJD]

Actually, they do have Tama.....and the Star kits are gorgeous and pricey. For Sonor it was ProLite and Vintage. I have a ProLite snare and love it but heard they may be phasing that line out.

[Drumming-4-Life]

Actually, they do have Tama.....and the Star kits are gorgeous and pricey. For Sonor it was ProLite and Vintage. I have a ProLite snare and love it but heard they may be phasing that line out.

I don't care for the Star kits, too rich for my blood. The Starclassic Maple and Bubinga, now that's a different story. They are worth a closer look. I really enjoy mine.

[Yodelling_Sheep]

Love my Ref Pure kit, can't recommend it highly enough. Optimounts are great and come as standard with them. It'll definitely be worth investigating different head options to find exactly the sound you want, but overall these drums just have the most wonderful tone. I'm not a fan of DW and I've played a few. Would take Sonor over them any day...