# My First Successful Snare Drum Build



## bendrum (Mar 21, 2014)

After a busy Summer and Fall show schedule with my band as well as my full time side job, I finally got a weekend off and was able to complete my first successful stave snare build. I had the shell pretty much done last Spring but had no time to even think about the drilling until a few weeks ago. I had 3 botched attempts before this one but persistence paid off. I plan to build more (next will be oak) and I'm currently refining my methods with my limited workspace which is becoming less as I buy more tools.


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## Stick486 (Jan 4, 2013)

success is right...


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## old55 (Aug 11, 2013)

Looks great Ben.


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## Herb Stoops (Aug 28, 2012)

I would have never thought of that. Good job, looks like birdseye maple too.
Fantastic.
Herb


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## dick in ia (Jul 23, 2007)

Beautiful work!
Dick


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## John Bradshaw (Sep 12, 2010)

*Drum on!*

Looks really really good. Hope you branch out to Tom Toms.


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## BIG OLD TIM (May 13, 2014)

Awesome! Who would have thought of that? You did fantastic!


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## jcayer (Aug 22, 2014)

Superb job ! 

Now this is a wood project that I would never thought of...
If you ever do a tutorial (youtube, pdf, making of pictures, etc.) I'm curious of how it is made !!!

Congrats !

Jean


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## ksidwy (Jul 13, 2013)

> ... but persistence paid off


It is really true! marvelous work!


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## mark greenbaum (Sep 26, 2010)

Did you glue up and then turn on a lathe? Sure looks great. Any photos of how you did it?


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## UlrichJ (Feb 16, 2012)

Great job!


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## rwl7532 (Sep 8, 2011)

mgdesigns said:


> Did you glue up and then turn on a lathe? Sure looks great. Any photos of how you did it?


It takes a pretty big lathe to turn drum shells. Pictured is likely a 14" diameter (13 7/8") shell.

Devising a way to rotate the shell over a router bit is another way (the way I did mine).
My setup is clamped together allowing the pieces to disassemble and get stored easily.

The inside was routed by the shell suspended by rollers as pictured.


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## Marco (Feb 21, 2009)

Hard build to beat, I mean..... Great looking drum Ben!


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## bendrum (Mar 21, 2014)

Thanks for the compliments everyone! Ralph is right on with this one. there's a good amount of info on the good old internet on how to do this and quite a few different approaches to building a stave snare. My approach was similar to Ralphs and I learned a few things from him as well. As a long time player, this was something I really wanted to try so I read as much as I could find and went to work. I can't take credit for doing anything original as it's all been done before. If not for those who I learned from I would've never thought of doing this either.


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## darsev (Feb 3, 2012)

Looks good. How does it sound?

Darryl


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