Thread: Wooden Stave Drums

Originally Posted by Scally

Three sets of African Dun Duns finally assemble, one set to go.
Each drum shell has 20 hardwood staves with 9 degree bevels.
Each stave has two biscuits.
The big drums were glued with epoxy and the smaller ones with titebond.
A bit of pyrography for decoration and a coat, inside and out, of Danish Oil/Estapol mix for a finish.
48 by 8mm rods bent into rings, welded, grinded, wrapped with cotton cloth and rope loops tied.
The weekend was spent fitting the soaked cow-skins to the 9 drums.
Next weekend we plan to finish the fourth set.
We are going to make a lot of noise soon.......

What did you use for the rings? Are you shaving the skins inside and out or leaving them "natural".
My dun-duns, djembe and ashiko were brought back from Conikri, Guinea by my b-i-l quite some time back. I'd love to get another larger set but the guy who made them was deported back to Sierra Leone and apparently died in the troubles there.

They look the goods. How do they sound.?

Thanks Artme but they sound like hitting a wet blanket at the moment.

The skins need to dry out completely.
Then the ropes are tightened to stretch the skin. This weekend I will see if I can start tightening a set with the thinner skin.

Hi Expat. Yes things are a bit unsettled in Conakry again.

I used 8mm steel rod for the rings. I bent it around a circular disc then welded them together. My welding is pretty bad so I had to do a fair bit of work with an angle grinder the clean them up.

The cow skins had been dried and cleaned up. They are soaked and put on the drums hair side up.

Once they dry on the drums I will shave most of the hair off and trim the rest short with clippers.

One day I would like to get a set of Guinea shells too. The originals look better than stave drums.