Morning chop: Wilcoxon #29

Vintage Corner: 1960s Ludwig pad (my latest rescue project)

My Latest rescue pad. 

Clearly not a museum piece, the repaired split down the middle of the base needed some further shoring up and the rubber had to be re-glued. But it’s not bad now. I made a mute for it from scraps. (Also, while not visible in the photos, I eventually removed the white rubber "feet" and the tiny nails holding them in place. The rubber had hardened and shrunk, causing some of the feet to actually rattle against the wood when the pad was struck. I replaced these feet with some thick neoprene rubber squares, in case I ever want to remove the pad from its mounting bracket. The rattle went away with the old feet.)

My partner certainly likes how quiet it is. It feels great. I LOVE these old Ludwig pads, especially the earlier models made of oak. (Later versions used a lighter weight wood — pine? Fir? Unknown — that had a different feel and resonance. Try to find one made from oak if you can.)

Bonus: the tilt is pretty mellow when compared to other pads of the era, making it a nice pad for the younger player who is still getting accustomed to traditional grip.

These pads often show up at rummage sales and various online outlets (FB marketplace, eBay, etc) for as little as $15-20 plus postage. I got this one for $30 with the stand included. The black rubber they used tends to last a very long time and is still bouncy and responsive fifty years on. Anyone just getting into vintage practice pads will enjoy finding and using one of these without spending a fortune.

Comparing old and new: Ludwig P-359 and Volkwein’s Tom’s Pad

I have a fondness for tunable pads, particularly the old Ludwig P-359 (8”) and P-360 (10”), and I’m also a fan of the Tom’s Pad from Volkwein’s Music. The former was at its height of production from the late 1960s through around 1980. Tom’s Pad went into production around ten years ago, long after the demise of the Ludwig models. 

I had an opportunity to obtain a second Tom’s Pad today, and when I brought it home, I immediately took it apart. I did so because this pad came with a Ludwig-branded head and I wanted to see if it was the same as the old heads from the Ludwig pad.  Tom’s Pad comes with a specially-branded head made by Remo, and is meant to take Remo practice pad replacement heads. The Remo head will not fit on an old Ludwig pad because the hoop of the heads differs in width and depth.

I have pieces of an old Ludwig P-359 pad on hand and would like to replace the very worn head that came with it. Since Ludwig no longer makes parts for these older pads, it’s a bit of luck to find parts that can be swapped in.

I took the Tom’s Pad apart, and discovered that the construction is nearly identical to that of the P-359. The only meaningful difference is in the metal rim.

As you can see from the photos, the components are nearly identical. The foam insert for the Ludwig pad is slightly thinner, but still curves down towards the edges like the thicker insert from the Tom’s Pad.

The other difference is that the hardware for the newer pad is a thicker Allen bolt that screws into threaded receivers in the base,w hole the hardware for the P-359 was an odd, over-engineered design using threaded bolts that were pressed into the base from underneath, and square nuts (which fit a standard drum key) screwed on from above to tighten the rim and head against the base. On both pads, a smaller wooden disc sits under the head and above the base, the foam rubber and head held in place above that by the rim and bolts. 

In both cases, only the pressure of tightening the bolts held everything together. (This is not unlike the approach used in Beetle Percussion’s “Last Pad,” the double-sided design of which I reviewed earlier. I will receive the single-sided version of the pad for testing and review closer to Spring.)

The hoop of both Ludwig heads is nearly identical, which tells me that they would both work on the P-359 pad. However, the Tom’s Pad came with a lot of wrinkles in the newer Ludwig head, and I suspect that may be due to having been stretched over the thicker foam rubber at pressure. When I reassembled the Tom’s Pad, I tensioned it a bit higher than it had been when I brought it home. it didn’t remove the wrinkles entirely, and if I keep this pad I’ll probably replace the head with a Remo practice pad head, which should lay better at tension. I’ll probably set aside the newer Ludwig head as a possible replacement for a P-359.

I decided to see if I could discern any meaningful difference between the response of a P-359 and the Tom’s Pad with the Ludwig head.

Obviously, with this Ludwig pad being at least fifty years old, the head is a little worn and I don’t want to crank it too tight. 

Then, I compared it with the Tom’s a pad with the Remo head.

Volkwein’s offers replacement rubber inserts and heads for the Tom’s Pad. Their replacement heads are embossed with Volkwein’s logo. If you don’t want that, a regular Remo practice pad head should fit just as well.

While comparisons are often made between the Volkwein pad and old Reno tunable pads, the Remo pad base uses a plastic bottom with a deep recess designed to hold foam rubber, with the head stretching over the recess. The result is that the Remo pad sounds hollower — and louder — than the Tom’s Pad.

In truth, the design of the Tom’s Pad is much closer to that of the old Ludwig P-359/360 pads, and in my opinion it’s a design that produces a better tone and feel. 

The Remo pad of the 1960s and 70s holds a special place in my heart because it’s the pad I began learning on. But the sound of that pad grated on my parents’ nerves, and successive generations of students were encouraged to find something else to practice on as soon as they showed they were serious about continuing with drums. I keep a few Remo pads in my collection to this day, but welcome play on them now. The Ludwig P-259 and 360, on the other hand, are in regular rotation on my practice pad stand. They’re solid and feel great. The Tom’s Pad also sees some chopping time. 

I’ve written to Volkwein’s Music a few times asking — imploring, really — that they consider making this pad in  10” size. Now that I have a better understanding of its design, I can see why they’ve kept with the 8” size. Still, I can dream.

Tom’s Pad is available from a Volkwein’s Music for a retail price of $85 plus shipping. It’s well-made and will last a long time with care. The Ludwig P-359 (8”) can sometimes be found used online, though in varying degrees of condition. The P-360 (10”) shows up far less often, and sells for far more because it’s the more desirable size among collectors and players alike.

Repairing vintage Ludwig pads

I love these old Ludwig pads from the 1960s and 70s.

For anyone who grew up playing on Mylar heads, these are darned near perfect. The feel is the closest to a real drum without the volume. They were sold separately and were also included in student kits with snare drum and bells.

Finding one today is difficult. Model P-378 (8”) turns up more often than model P-379 (10”), but you really have to scour the online want ads for them. Ludwig stopped making these pads in 1980 or so. They offered the parts for a few more years, but then stopped making those too. Very occasionally, I’ve found a replacement head or a few tensioning nuts online, but they’re rare and expensive because the seller usually knows what they have.

When I do find one, they are very often quite used, sometimes abused, and in need of repair. Lacking a supply of replacement parts, I’ve had to make do with what’s in front of me.

The original wood used for the baseplate and internal base was very soft, probably pine, to cut down on production costs. Unfortunately, that means it’s fragile and wears with time and use. The construction is simple, and that means a worn pad can be repaired or at least extended pretty easily.

So far, I’ve been lucky. I’ve been able to repair every pad I’ve found and make it useable again. Sometimes, it’s a matter of removing pieces, cleaning them up and reassembling.

Other times, the wood baseplate is pretty beaten up — splintered and/or warped — and I have to remove all of the metal buts, reverse the baseplate and reinstall them from the other side. Doing this helps to reverse some of the effects of warping, and gives the heads of each “finned screw” new wood to bite into.

In a couple of cases, owing to lack of replacement heads, I’ve chosen to add another layer to the head. Either from the underside or directly on top, to help the head last longer. Neither approach seems to affect the sound or feel adversely.

The latest pad I found, an 8” model, came from a private seller cleaning out her garage. We agreed on a price and I got the pad home, where I dismantled it and examined the pieces.

The baseplate was pretty hammered, and one of the tensioning nuts had rusted frozen to the finned screw. In order to save this pad, I would have to carve a bit of the wood away so I could gain purchase with pliers

and hold onto it while applying a spot of oil and turning the tensioning nut. I reasoned that when I had removed the screw, I could fill in the gouge with a thing piece of wood cut to fit, apply it with wood glue, and gently poke a new hole in the spot.

After removing the final screw, I filled in the divot with the tiny piece of wood and set it in the divot with wood glue, clamping it in place. When it dries, I should be able to carefully drill a new hole, ream it to size, and reassemble the pad.

(The tape applied on the side is there to keep the wood glue from running out.)

Once dry enough, I removed the clamp, poked a hole and called it good. The screw went in easily, and held fast to the new underside.

Other enthusiasts of this make and model, most notably Rick Dior, has a full workshop of tools, so when he has to restore one of these pads, he simply cuts a new baseplate from hardwood and installs the metal pieces into the new baseplate.

Since I don’t have power tools or much woodworking experience, I tend to do repairs that are more rough-and-ready. My goal is to make these pads useable again, not museum-worthy.

After flipping the baseplate, I reinstalled the threaded hole assembly. This required some care, so I wouldn’t crack the plywood baseplate while sinking the teeth into the other side. I laid shop rags across my bench vise with the jaws open, to allow the threaded center to poke through the other side without mangling the metal. 

Then I reinstalled the thick seating washer and the little rubber feet. I also laid in some Elmer’s Glue-All along the edges where the plywood was roughly finished. The hope is the fast-drying glue will help to keep those edges from splintering further. I can color them in with black paint pen if I like. 

And voila! Good enough to play for years to come.

Meanwhile, I’ll keep my eyes peeled for replacement parts.

BONUS TIPS:

1. In the old Ludwig parts catalog from 1970 (see first photo at top), The square nut for the tuning assembly is referred to as part # P-124. If you try to look for this part today you won't find it, as Ludwig stopped making it years ago.
However, Ludwig continued making and selling their part # P-125, advertised as the Super Classic Strainer Butt Plate Part, for a number of years after that (photo at left).

Guess what? It's exactly the same part, and will fit the threaded bolt on the old Ludwig pads. And if you ask for it by the other part number and name, you may have a slightly easier time finding a few.

2. Thanks to fellow Ludwig pad enthusiast Rick Dior, I was able to obtain these black vinyl end caps that slide over the tuning nuts, thereby saving my sticks from getting chopped up during practice. 

You can find them on eBay and elsewhere, or perhaps at a large local hardware store. For this application, get the size with the 6.5mm inside diameter.