can someone help me I.D. this Ludwig snare

[drumtimejohn]

The drum is likely Chicago. Bowties were common. Some were the good ones but those usually have flush inserts and non-slotted screws. If interior is original it can be an off-white. They also came in light beige and brown speckled. Many of those models had a B/W badge. Sometimes w/o serial. That could have been yours. The better usually had B/O. It was a goofy time in Ludwig. Some of the hoops were stamped Taiwan and had square gates. I think the brown speckled very thin 4 ply and the clear maple 6 ply sounded best. The heavily poplar models seemed like b stocks and had not so great bearing edges from the ones I owned. Sometimes flat.

 

[hsosdrum]

From at least the 50’s through the 80’s Ludwig used poplar for inner plys and they do again for the high end legacy models

Ludwig shells were 3-ply mahogany/poplar/mahogany with maple re-rings from 1923 until mid-1968, when they began using maple (instead of mahogany) for the inside ply on wrapped drums, and began using maple instead of both mahogany plies on lacquer-finished drums. In both cases the center ply was still poplar.

When Ludwig switched from 3-ply/re-ring construction to 6-ply/no re-ring construction in 1976 they used a combination of maple and poplar. This construction continued into the 1990s with the 6-ply Classic series and the 4-ply Super Classic series.

Ludwig finally eliminated the poplar around 1997 when they introduced the Classic Maple series, which is all maple.

Ludwig's current Legacy Maple and Legacy Mahogany series return to Ludwig's late-1960s 3-ply configurations: maple/poplar/maple and mahogany/poplar/mahogany, both with maple re-rings.

There's nothing wrong with poplar — it's a good 'tone wood', not cheap filler. Listen to the folks who play '50s – '60s vintage Ludwig drumsets talk about all the "mojo" those old drums have. (Although from your 4th photo it does seem that Ludwig used lower-grade poplar in that particular Rocker-series drum.)

 

[mikepmcde]

Ludwig shells were 3-ply mahogany/poplar/mahogany with maple re-rings from 1923 until mid-1968, when they began using maple (instead of mahogany) for the inside ply on wrapped drums, and began using maple instead of both mahogany plies on lacquer-finished drums. In both cases the center ply was still poplar.

When Ludwig switched from 3-ply/re-ring construction to 6-ply/no re-ring construction in 1976 they used a combination of maple and poplar. This construction continued into the 1990s with the 6-ply Classic series and the 4-ply Super Classic series.

Ludwig finally eliminated the poplar around 1997 when they introduced the Classic Maple series, which is all maple.

Ludwig's current Legacy Maple and Legacy Mahogany series return to Ludwig's late-1960s 3-ply configurations: maple/poplar/maple and mahogany/poplar/mahogany, both with maple re-rings.

There's nothing wrong with poplar — it's a good 'tone wood', not cheap filler. Listen to the folks who play '50s – '60s vintage Ludwig drumsets talk about all the "mojo" those old drums have. (Although from your 4th photo it does seem that Ludwig used lower-grade poplar in that particular Rocker-series drum.)

very interesting!! thank u for that bit of information!

 

[K.O.]

did ludwig ever resort to poplar? and if so when

Ludwig/WFL drum shells were predominantly poplar from the late 30s when WFL was started, continuing through the mid 50s when WFL changed its name to "Ludwig" and on until the 1990s when they went to an all-maple shell as their top tier drums (until replaced in that position by the Legacy lines which are again mostly poplar).

You can wax poetic all you want about the mahogany and maple in vintage WFL/Ludwig drums but the fact is those shells were at least 70% poplar sandwiched between two very thin plies of the other woods.

This also applies to Slingerland Radio King drums (not the one ply maple snares though, obviously) and their later 3 ply shells, as well as the early Gretsch 3 ply shells. Most vintage drums contain a lot of poplar (or, in the case of 6 ply Gretsch, Gumwood).