Stainless steel drum kits aren’t exactly new, but it is a fairly new thing for Drum Workshop.
The review kit consisted of 12×9” mounted tom, 14×12 and 16×14” floor toms, 22×18 bass drum and a 14×6.5 snare drum. The mounted tom featured DW’s STM mount, while the floor toms were on legs, and all of the toms had DW’s solid True Hoops. They were fitted with DW/Remo Double A two-ply smooth white heads on top and clear single ply heads on the resonant side. The bass drum had a clear batter head and a standard DW front logo head, while the snare had a Remo coated Ambassador/hazy snare-side combination.
All of the shells are 1.5mm rolled from a single piece of steel and then welded together. They have 45 degree bearing edges, chrome hardware and DW’s True Pitch 50 tension rods. They’re polished to a mirror finish which offsets nicely against the hardware.
Tom sizes range from 8 to 18” (four mounted tom sizes and three floors) with bass drums starting at 22 going up to 26” (including a 23”), the thinnest size coming in at 26×14”. Snare drums are available in half inch increments from 13×4.5” up to 13×6.5 with the same in 14”. They come with the usual Mag throw off, 3P butt plate and 20 strand DW True Tone wires.
There’s no mistaking these drums are two things – heavy and loud. Having said that though, they play beautifully and are very enjoyable both visually and sonically. In fact, of the three kits we tried that day, Mike and I both agreed this was the one we liked the best (the other two being the 45th Anniversary and the Purple Heart kits).
The drums sound very deep and fat but not harsh or overly ringy. As a collection, they all sound like they belong together – which is not always the case – and there’s no one drum that’s stands above the others. They definitely sound like a DW kit, but the only thing really stopping you seeing one of these kits down the local pub is the price; obviously, they’re not cheap.
That aside though, they are as well made as any DW drum I’ve seen, and what you’d probably expect too. And, given that they’re made of stainless steel, they’ll probably last you a lifetime anyway so the investment might be more agreeable in those terms.
More at www.dwdrums.com
Thanks to GEWA Germany for making this review possible.
David Bateman
January 2018
