I saw in the 2007 DCI program that a new line of marching intruments under the name of Quantum is coming out next year. It had the Mapex symbol/name on it but i don't know what their like or about. If anyone has info on them please tell me. Thank

That's the first I heard of it, but I was able to find a press release on the Mapex web site:
http://usa.mapexdrums.com/news/news_story.asp?ID=152

Quote:

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The Quantum Marching Project is a collaborative effort between Jupiter brass, Mapex drums and Majestic percussion brands to offer a full series of marching and pit instruments...

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Jupiter actually had a line of marching drums in the early '90s. Arizona Sun, a Class A (Div. II) corps, used them.

It will be cool to see how someone fairs that is completely new to the market.

These will be a tough sell though, no matter who they offer a free set to, but I'm still curious to see who ends up marching these next year.

Mapex makes some very nice drum sets. Hopefully their marching will be the same standards as the sets.

Mapex has come a long way in the set world, they used to have some real heaps.

Hopefully this will work better for them than it did for tama...

As far as I'm aware the Tama drums were concept only and never made it market? Am I wrong?

No, that's accurate.

As the story goes, once tama figured out how much was actually involved and who they'd have to compete with at what level (DCI corporate sponsorships), they bagged the idea.

One of the initial issues was weight, which with that brand shouldn't be a surprise.

I'm curious to see if Mapex gives the line another astronomy-linked name, there's some cool stuff they could call the drums.

Saw this on another site-

It appears to be an ffx with Yamaha mts/stabilizers and the Dynasty strainer/j bars attachments.

It's really disappointing to think they just used everyone else's ideas.

Thoughts?

I'm not disappointed at all. If it has the sound of all 3 drums put together than I think they may have a great product. I hope the hardware is as tough as Yamaha's.

It's also nice to see a top snare unit with an easy throw off like Yamaha has. I wish Dynasty would come out with a new design.

Tama (Hoshino) produced a marching snare drum. It was heavy and expensive. I got a chance to play on it a few years back...It sounded...well...like a snare...*sigh*

well little by little things are being released on the drums.. ASU is testing them.. so far this is the only pic of the snares i've seen with the logo sticker.. i really can't figure out how they are not going to get sued. Pearl rims. and counter hoops. Yamaha tension posts with nodes, not to mention the top strainer... Dynasty main strainer.. Ludwig snare guards.. at least they look pretty..

Top rim & tension ring: Pearl
Tension Posts: Pearl
Bottom rim & guards: Pearl
Snare strainer: Dynasty
Nodes: Yamaha
Carrier: Randall May in the ASU pic; old-school tilters in previous pictures

Is there anything original about this drum? I wonder what the tenors are like.

well here on their myspace you can see the majestic verson tenors which pretty much look like a Pearl articulite rip off.. carrier system i'm sure will be different.. well i hope.. the bass drums do have a mapex look.. from what you can see. I wish they would just post some pics from ASU.

Quantum myspace

I'm pretty sure the carriers are left over from ASU's Pearl drums.. according to the blog they just got the prototypes on September 14. I'm guessing they are messing with the shell material more then the hardware

Unless Pearl and Yamaha have some sort of semi-exclusivity agreement with them, I bet Quantum goes with the Randall-May carriers, at least initially -- they already have system that works with tubular tension casings, they work with pretty much all bass drums, and the Quantum consortium can design their own tenor frame as long as it uses J-bars.

Whether they would stick with RM afterward would probably depend on their capability to come up with equivalent carriers at a lower price point -- those tubular carriers ain't cheap!

see them in action with Irondale winterline... snares sound like Yamaha's tenors definitely sound like Pearl. basses who knows.. Youtube sound quality sucks..

Irondale

I dont mean to get far off topic but it seems like drum manufacturers are all copying off of each other not only in the marching world but the kit world too. Look at the mapex marching snare it looks like Pearl and Yamaha had a baby, whats up with that? In the kit world mapex copies tama almost to a T and Yamaha copies Pearl's style in drum kits. Don't get me wrong I love all of these brands and mapex had the right idea of putting all of the top bands together but they should have made their own look.

I personally don't like the fact that they took everyone else's ideas. Unlike Pearl Dynasty and Yamaha (i don't count Ludwig...) Those are all origional concepts... This just looks like a big mixture of the 3... Like they all had an orgy together and this is what came out..

I think it will be a great product if it's a combination of the 3. If the quality is anything like that of mapex's sets, then I'm deffinitely looking forward to seeing and hearing them.

After Academy Auditions, I will tell you how they feel/Sound.

Imperial Percussion Theater will be taking delivery of 1 of 2 sets of indoor prototype marching drums from Mapex (Jupiter Band Instruments). If everyone can hold out till NAMM great things are in the works. I have seen it myself. If you have questions about the products please send me a pm or email me. Constitution will be the other ensemble with the other set. IPT will take delivery of the drums in January 08.

Looks like Mapex has a lot to offer as far as finishes and hardware goes.
Check out the site.

http://www.quantummarching.com/quantumToms.aspx?cId=66&lId=7&sId=6

I'm curious to see what the "Q-ball" carrier is and how those quads are going to sound the way they're cut.

Also- I love tube lugs on drumkits, but I think the marching version may have to grow on me.

I think I like how those tube lugs look, but I'm a little concerned about their ability to handle high tensions. The shape of a tube lug isn't all that rigid and it transfers stress to the shell in two small, concentrated spots. Here's hoping Mapex's engineers built something stronger than it looks.

it's kind of a silly thing, but IMO the mapex logo looks really dumb on the side of the snare / on the bass head. I think it has to do with that massive oval around the outside. Other than that the drums look good, I like the finish options they're showing too.

I find it interresting that the high tension (XT) snare weighs almost as much as the hefty Dynasty snares and looks superficially almost identical to a Yamaha. Anyone know what the birch interior does for the sound or what a "reinforced" gut strand is?

I hope they did some market research before they decided to market the "HT" snare -- I really don't see the point. The HT uses the old Ludwig approach to shell integrity (i.e. aluminum bearing edge) and weighs more than the XT, so you're not getting head-to-wood contact or weight savings and I doubt it will cost much less.

I'm really curious about the tenors -- the drums look like two spocks and a 10" but I'm wondering if they're the final shell design or are just to display the "styling". I'm sort of disappointed that they're going with the decent-but-uninspired XL omnirail; I figured they would work something out with RM.

I'm not terribly worried about tube tenor casings. Since torque is the real issue with one-sided tension casings breaking (the area around the bottom screw usually breaks) I don't believe that additional surface area between the two attachment points would make any difference.

If nothing else, it looks like Quantum will have some really fantastic finishes available!

BTW, what is are Remo UT (tenor) and UM (bass) heads? Is it a new line of heads? Quantum lists them as the heads supplied with their basses and tenors.

From the Remo Drum Talk forum, the UT line is a cheaper, lesser quality version of Crimplock Ambassador made in Asia and generally used on new kits.

The UM appears to be a similar version of the Powermax.

These drums sound really good. We used them for the Academy audition. The basses caught my attention. They didn't seem to project as well as one could have hoped, but I was reassured by someone that its because they put the heads on that morning, and they weren't properly muffled/broken in.

The Tenors are quite heavy. Their shells are as deep, if not deeper then pearls, and are cut at a very shallow angle. They project very well. The snares are as heavy or slightly heavier then Dynastys; I say this because my school marched Dynastys. They also project well, and are very crisp, but still fat sounding.

I believe that no matter what they look like, they will have a unique sound, and be a serious contender in the marching percussion world.

I was wondering how those tenors were going to sound, if they are deeper than pearls then geez thats petty deep. Dragon made them sound good for a first impression so I'm looking forward to trying these out.

Sounds like they will be a pain to march but will sound good enough for people to want to use them.

Exactly.

They sounded great with low tuning. Never sounded like a Bucket. lol But the weight is a factor.

I recently looked in the reviews and saw the new mapex snares. Has anyone seen or played on these? Do you have any predictions of how this will match up to the Pearl,Yamaha, Dynasty, and Premier?

I know some guys that use them. they choose them over Pearl and Yamaha, who were giving better deals pricing wise.
They played the snares right next to each other, as well as the tenors and basses. What they said was the sounds were more homogenous than any other brand.
they must be doing something right.

Interesting thing is the basses have aluminum alloy hoops. I know my kids have broken a few hoops over the years, this should help. Also the basses are made of maple. I love the sound of Pearl's maple basses. The larger basses are also available in wider dimensions to produce better tone. The tenors use XL's omnirail system which I have used. I like the Omnirail, but the j-bars are smaller than standard Randall May, so I had to modify them to make them work with our stands. The snares look pretty good too, plenty of finish options. I really would like to see these in person and hear how they sound. They look like they could be real competitors in marching percussion.

I've heard a lot of these. You'll see a WGI group marching these this year. Keep an Eye out for ConstiTution Percussion, and Ear out for that matter. These guys come out hammering and put more heart in their shows than just about any other group i've seen out there. Rumor is that their tenors are loud as crap, and their snares have a cool feature to them that you'll see soon enough. Im going to go check them out when they get their drums in.

-Justin

Woodwind and Brasswind (www.wwbw.com) has Quantum stuff up for pre-order, along with pics of the tenors.

Looks like snares and basses are priced in line with Pearl and Dynasty, with tenor prices nearer to Yamaha (hard to compare definitively though, since some brands come with carrier and some without.)

The finish is rad.
As always with mapex.

Those are some nice looking tenors. I'd love for my line to jump on those.......

Mapex drums... so far, I like what I've seen/heard/played on.

Here is a video of Academy on the Drums.

Another video in RMast's channel.

So what do you guys suggest about carriers??? Our school is purchasing a new set of drums and we're probably going to go with these guys. I've got what drums we're gonna need. But I havent't heard many opinions on carriers. What carriers would you guys suggest???

I would go with the Magnesium vest tube or the XL lite aluminum vest carriers.
http://pearldrums.com/chamcarr.asp
http://www.xlspec.com/cat.asp?CatID=3&am...20Lite%20Series

I have seen these drums been used by a highschool. In Irondale Minnesota, a Highschool has landed a deal with Mapex, and they got the demo drums to use, since prolly they were really good. They sound nice, but Yes they copied a lot of other drum co.

it looks copied cause Jupiter (Mapex's Parent Company) makes those parts for other companies. yes it is hard to swallow for some but it is the truth and ims ticking to it. I will stand by these drums that they are AWESOME! Reason Irondale got that deal is cause of Paul Weber, if there is no one better out there to test prototype drums it is Paul Weber. If you have questions about these drums please let me know. I have been involved with the testing process and redesign aspect of the drums and accessories my self.

We're using Quantum drums at Surf this year. They're okay I guess. We've had some durability issues with lug casings on the spocks, but nothing too major. Drums are drums. To be totally honest, if I was blindfolded I couldn't tell you if I was playing a Pearl, Yamaha, Premier or what have you.

But I guarantee that if you call up Mapex about those lugs, theyll take care of you. They have with everyone else I've dealth with. We are using them at one of the high schools that im helping out with.

-Justin