Sonor Artist 6x14 Cast Bronze Snare Drum Chrome Hardware

[Jules]

https://reverb.com/item/89963348-sonor- ... e-hardware

Photo Credit: Reverb

I have considered doing this to my Artist Bronze, for the purpose of putting on Hella Hoops and having all matching hardware. They make Hellas in the black chrome (or whatever the proper color name is), but they have been out of stock for a while and don't know when they will be back.

Here are MY concerns with this drum, and why this listing made me decide not to change out my hardware for chrome.

I am not sure if all Sonor parts are made the same. An example is that I have 2 Phil Rudd snare drums and one of them had serious pitting on the lug casings, so I went to the spare parts page to scout out new parts: https://www.sonor.com/fileadmin/user_up ... 405_pr.pdf

The item number for the lugs on that particular drum is 190 385 01, and the German made snare drums from that are and even today have a part number of 190 250 01. Beyond that, when I actually got the parts, the bags were marked with the part number and Phil Rudd Snare in the nomenclature.

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The Phil Rudd snare drum was a very economical snare drum, if you recall. It had a street price of $399 when it came out, so you wouldn't expect it to be on par with the higher end Sonor snare drums.

So, what does that have to do with this Artist Bronze? For the Dual Glide System; nothing. But the source of the chrome lugs concerns me. And only Asian import (Sonor) snares come with stickers on the triple flange hoops. For comparison, here is the Asian made Aluminum Kompressor next to the German made Beech Kompressor. The German made drum does not have the stickers on the hoops.

That's leads us onto my real concern... take another look at the Kompressor Aluminum snare. Single lugs, and 20 of them. Sonor hasn't made public spare parts pages for the Kompressor series drums, but considering the price difference between the Kompressor line and the higher end drums, and the fact that Sonor has used similar looking, but different parts on more economical drums on the past, I think it is plausible that the Asian Kompressor drums have lugs that aren't exactly the same as the German snare drums. So, that makes me wonder what was the origin of the chrome lugs on this Bronze snare drum.

It is completely feasible that someone with a 14X8 Aluminum Kompressor swapped lugs and hoops with the Artist Bronze, and all that left was sourcing the Dual Glide System. And, if that were to be the case, that will leave someone with a very expensive drum and questionable hardware. I would purchase that drum with caution, and try to get an explanation if I were a potential buyer. I also will wait for the black chrome Hella hoops for my drum!

(Note:) The lugs on this Artist Bronze could be from any of Sonor's upper end drums from the current or past incarnations of snares, toms, bass drums, etc. which bear the same lug design. Or they could have been ordered as new spare parts for this drum. I am NOT making a claim that the drum has Asian lugs, I am simply presenting cause for concern, since no explanation is provided in the description.)