Thread: Dun duns

Still waiting for the cow skin but they should arrive this week.

The rings are all welded and covered with cloth.

The rope loops have been tied to the outer rings.
A couple of rings are very tight. I will probably need to make new sets or sand the drum shells down a bit.

The cow skins should arrive this week.

A bit of a pain because I am heading down to Tasmania today.

With a bit of luck I might find a nice stick of timber down there somewhere.

I will be busy when I get back in a week or two.

My big Gecko dun has had more trips than me. The pic is of a show at a festival in Wollongong. It also went to the Blue Mountains and Gosford.

A drumming friend is looking after a ski resort in Japan for a few months.
She is looking for some drumming practice while she is there.

This is a pic of a Taiko drum group playing outside the resort in minus 10 degrees.
You have to be keen!!

Uhhh, the skins on those Taiko drums... at minus 10.... must be built for it!

My cow skins finally arrived.
They were on the small side but I didn't feel like waiting for another order.

A couple of mates came around and we managed to get six duns skinned.

those look great scally. are you happy with the sound?

It is a bit hard to tell what the sound will be like at the moment.

The skins are pulled pretty firmly over the drum but they are still wet.

It is hard to resist giving them a light tap with your fingers to test the sound. The Sangban sounded really good.

As the skin dries over the next week it will naturally tighten and the sound will improve.

When it is completely dry, you bring up the tension on the vertical ropes until you get the sound you are after.

I tried to select the thicker areas of skin for the biggest drum and the thinnest for the smallest. This should get the best from each drum.
I also selected a thicker skin for one end of the drum and a thinner pieces for the other. This will give some variation for each end of the drum.

For the moment it just needs some patience until the skin dries and the tuning can begin.

Maybe I should start on some drum stands to keep me occupied.

The first set of dunduns had a work out last week.

They have a nice full sound and played well.
They will keep changing for a few weeks before they settle down.

I have the second set tuned pretty tight and will deliver them at tomorrow night's drum lesson.

They sound better with heavier sticks. Tassie oak is OK but Spotted Gum is much better.

I need to find someone with a lathe who is willing to turn up a stack of Spotted Gum stick for me.

The drum skins need room to move when you are playing them. Some drummers strap three poles to each drum like a tripod or rest them on chairs. I am trying to come up with something a bit more purpose-built.

The rack I made for mine works well but it takes up a fair bit of room in a car. I am trying to work out a design that is easy to assemble and dis-assemble.
I just made a ring base for the dununba. It is nice and stable. The plan is to strap the other two drums to the dununba. It could be a neat idea if it works out.

I have a few Cross frames - like a simple deck chair - that can be used for each drum. I would like to get the stands to fold nice and flat so they don't take up too much space in a car. Plus the height needs to be different for each drum.

Well done Scally

I have a lathe and can turn sticks robert
Jeff

You're a champ Jeff.

I'll give you a call and bring down some of my "prototypes"

I bought a few commercial dundun sticks. They are about 5/8" diameter and 16-18" long made of Hickory.
They take a beating well. They don't split like Tassie Oak after being repeatedly used on the rim or the bells.
They feel a bit light.

I bought some 20mm Spotted Gum. It feels much denser than Tassie Oak and Hickory. I am hoping that it is also more durable.

The descriptions I have read of sticks used in West Africa is that they taper from a good 3/4" down to 1/2".
I think they would be good because you have a Heavy end and a Light end.

I have tried to shape a narrow neck about 70-90mm from the thick end. It feels comfortable to use and looks a bit more interesting.

I know most drummers just chop up a piece of dowel or a broom stick but I would like to come up with a timber and dimensions that are better than that.

Cheers

I'm writing an article on building stave drums and some of the participants in this thread appear to have a lot of expertise in this area.

Would any of you be interested in serving as a formal contributor to this effort? Your involvement would include answering some questions that I would pose to you either via email or over the telephone. It would also be ideal if you could provide some photographs of any of your current or past drum shell builds. You would be formally credited as a contributor, any photographs would also be formally credited to you and were we to use any quotes from our emails or conversations, you would cited accordingly.

If you are interested in participating in this project, I can be contacted via email at [email protected] or just post another reply to this thread.

Thank you in advance for your attention.

\cbf

cfernald, thanks for your interest.

I have sent you an email and would be happy to provide you with whatever information I can.

Finally making progress on four sets of dunduns.

Timber staves are a mix of NSW reds from the north coast.

The pics show the glue-up and shaping process.

I used a roundover bit to shape the edges.

Shells are sanded to #120 and will be further sanded to #180 after a bit of decoration.

I bought a pyro tool to burn the Geckos onto the shell this time.

It gets really hot.