Yet another question, and yet again, its about....TENOR HEADS! So, I have a set of heads on my tenors now that I am hoping to get through band camp with (Or two-a-days, as some call it) before I change out heads for the show heads and the rest of the year. These heads I have now are playable, but like normal heads they are starting to feel the wear of the high tension and the constant practice for 6 months.

I use the good old pinstripe's, And my 8 inch once again seems to be the problem head. It went flat, so when I attempted to reset the head, I found it was basically bone dry and the two plys were not touching. (in the playing area) The first time, it continued sounding muffled, I reset the head, and it was muffled again, I attempted to do it again, and had a huge air pocket in the head, Somehow I got it out when resetting the head AGAIN. This is making the drum sound like it has a odd muffle on it, Is there anyway to save this? Or am I going to have to tap into some of the show heads to get through camp?

One of the alumni was saying something about the head running out of oil?

I've heard of putting a hole in the head with a pin to let the air out, which couldn't hurt if it doesn't work. Other than that you don't have any options but to replace the head. And your problem doesn't have anything to do with oil, Pinstripes don't have any oil in them.

If you've got an air pocket in a Pinstripe head, you can use a sharp needle to poke a hole in the bottom layer to let the air escape. I usually poke the hole right under the stripe, on the opposite side of the head from the playing area.

It takes a little while for the air to escape, so don't expect instant results.

try using a lighter to shrink the mylar alittle
that head has strached thets why there is too much space between the two layers. this may or may not work

I'm going to go ahead and disagree with that suggestion.

If you're inexperienced enough to be asking this type of question on an internet forum, I would hesitate to encourage that same person to take an open flame to equipment.

In a pinch, hair dryers have been known to un wrinkle some unsightly bass 5 head dents.

Bottom line- buy a new head and save the lighter for the keyboard cord.

Yeah if the pinstripes are sounding muffled, it means they're about a quart and a half low. You may want to replace the filter as well.

Kidding! I used to think the same thing, since pinstripes have that rainbow effect that looks like oil, and they used to make "hydraulic" heads that did have oil in between the plies. Never heard of anyone thinking a head ran out of oil before though

It's a common misconception that there's oil between the plies of a Pinstripe head because there can be a sort of rainbow effect when you look at/through a new head. It looks a lot like the same rainbow colors you might see looking at an oil slick on a wet road, but the rainbow in the drum head is just caused by light refracting differently through each layer of Mylar.



Evans is the company that makes hydraulic heads, and they're still on the market. They're intended for use on drum set and give a very low, non-resonant "thud" or "slap" sound.

i only suggest a lighter cuz there alittle easier to come than a hairdryer in most situations and i dont recomend that you (original poster) do this it was more a suggestion for your tech or director to do for you

you could just deal with a head that doesn't sound quite perfect. our line goes for months with busted heads.

Yea, I've never really heard of using the flame on the tenor heads, But I have heard of the hairdryer/lighter to remove some of the big bass drum marks, Then again, thats one ply.

So magically today, the head came back for about an hour, just warming up, then just randomly in the middle of a chart it died again, The head looks fine on the drum now, its just dead. My 4th drum is also kind of like this, but not nearly as bad. The volume alone on the 1 drum is about half, and there is virtually no ring. Bottom line, it sounds like an amazing head if your tuning a drumset.

So, It looks like I'm just going to run this head as "something to hit". The OCD in me can not stand having a brand new head on a set of tenors with weathered heads, I'll just change these out before the season starts, or strap up another set and use these for practice.