Your content is nirvana for cymbal junkies with explanations of how profile anomalies and other factors affect sound. Thank you so much for taking the time to educate. This is the PhD level stuff many of us have been starving for. I need to get my overweight 20” to you before your turnaround time is measured in years!
Ah thank you! There’s so much material here and I always wished I could find it. Making it has really become something I love. Feel free to reach out about that mod! I’ve got an order form on the website for that! reveriedrums.com/shop/p/cymbal-modification
I feel like discovering this channel is going to cost me a LOT of time and money.... :) ... I mean that in the best possible way. I guess I know what to do with the extra shed out back now. This is awesome. Thanks for sharing your craft. Gives me the chills.
That repair job that you did, they do the same thing to carillon bells in old fashioned bell towers. I read that Big Ben, the bell, was cracked from being struck by too heavy a hammer, and so a similar surgery was done to it, and it was turned 45 degrees so that the new, lighter hammer would strike a new location. It is that crack that gives it a twangy sound instead of a bonging sound.
That makes total sense! With a cymbal, another reason for removing more material is to adjust the weight and cause the cymbal to lay differently on the stand. It’ll causes the cymbal to lay opposite the crack so you don’t play over the repair.
Amazing work as always, I just heard the new 22” ARTISAN 40TH ANNIVERSARY RAW BELL RIDE, and your cymbal work blows it out of the water. Sabian should call you for help.😉🙌
Great video, Tim! Really informative, like using wider bits to reduce chatter at the rivet holes, etc. The cymbals really opened up after lathing, and I love the burnish on the first cymbal. Both sounded great, but I probably liked the first cymbal more, maybe its psychological on my part, because of the cracks in the second one, even though you've repaired it. Thank you for posting this, I look forward to more.
Hey man. First off, thank you for the wealth of info you're putting onto the internet! I'm curious about modding a few zbt's I have but I haven't the slightest idea how much hp or rpm I need for the motor. Care to share? Maybe a video about the tools even? I'm sure a lot of people will be interested as there's hardly any info about it on the internet.
0:40 Looks like an OS 4b. The “Made in Turkey” part of the 4a stamp doesn’t wrap around the moon. The blocking of Istanbul/Zildjian is more consistent with OS4 than OS3 or earlier. Great mods as always. Love how the 20” turned out!
I like smaller one much more. I wonder can you make thin muddy and washy cymbal sound articulate and livelier again? Maybe by curving it to deeper profile...?
Yep, that usually involves hammering to balance tension and possibly raising the shape. Most of the time an issue with muddiness is an issue with the balance of tension more than the weight of the cymbal.
Brave man 😊 but nice results! You def changed those two into ones that can be played and sound good in a light/jazz setting. I appreciate the perspective of “only original once” but personally agree that Old Ks are pieces of art that can be used to create another art form (music) IF the sound is there, and you’ve given these two “that sound” imho. 😊👍
Both sound great! Love how you reimagine these old plates!!! So, what do you do with the shaved bronze? Is there anything that can be done? Thanks for the videos!!
Always an education! 😉👍 While it may hurt to see the original patina of 60-70yrs go bye bye, it really comes down to two things.....1, what the customer wants the customer gets...... 2, if it's a player and not a museum piece, what sounds best?. The "marching" cymbal was interesting. I've heard drummers use them as rides before, and they can be very effective, IF you want all ping and cut. The crash ability is kind of useless 🤷♂. You took it to a good place. Now it's a musically versatile instrument. To me it still has that "old" cymbal character, and there's still a little of that old K klang. The customer is getting back a nice usable vibey instrument 💁♂ That 22 wasn't too bad. The pitch and stick def were cool. It was the un-even overtones that weren't really pleasant. The upper mid range was kinda harsh & blurry. It's tough to get a ride that's been compromised to be exactly what you want. You really cleaned up the over tones and didn't change the pitch too much. Learning why you cut out a crack wider than a thin cut with little holes was eye opening. I've always drilled and cut out middle cracks in the way that ride was given to you. The thinking being the more material left the better. I've seen many cymbal repairs done with wide cut outs and never understood why they did that........ya learn something new everyday 😉👍 I'm still saving my farthings to have you mod a couple rides for me 😊🙏
Hi Timothy. Love the results! I see that you’re working on heavy cymbals that are too pingy, but is there a way to modify thin cymbals that are too washy?
Yeah, I do that fairly often too. They’re definitely more limited in what I can do and oftentimes I’m tasked with making them sound less like they are thin. It’s a challenge but I really enjoy it!
Hi Timothy. I think the back and forth lathing interferes with a classic regular vintage-style lathing. It looks odd to me. Also the high amount of unwanted 'chatter' is mostly due to a lack of proper sized backing plates. You definetely need those for lathing, also to reduce loss of profile. The clutter from bumping in and out of the rivet holes is WAY too big in my opinion. You can vastly diminish that by using proper plates combined with a very low RPM when working that area...
Hi Daan. Thanks for the comment. While I agree with you in principle, the other factor is the cymbal itself. These older cymbals with their wonky shapes can lead to the chatter. Could I have gone slower to limit it? Sure, but the task of removing 1000g makes that not feasible, time-wise. I actually like lathing with the backing plates that I use. It allows me full control over how much pressure I use and I can really see/feel what's going on with the metal. I've lathed well over 2000 cymbals in the last few years alone and this technique works well for me. Lastly the "crossover" lathing (as I call it) is a sonic choice. I don't really care that it looks "correct". I care about the final sound. Same for the chatter. There are many old K cymbals and other handmade cymbals that have chatter and sound great.
There no doubt that for my taste, both cymbals became much better, especially the 19.5” K but I have a question. I’d have guessed the crack repair in the middle of the 22” would have ended with the crackstop holes being enlarged, providing a radius hopefully too wide for the crack to propagate. Why cut out all that lies between? I’d think the bigger crackstop holes would be enough. Thanks again for sharing your knowledge and processes!
Thank you! Technically, just widening the outer holes can be a perfectly fine repair. I widen it for the visual effect and to remove a bit more mass, which causes the cymbal to lean away from where the crack is. This keeps the playing surface away from the repair.
Hey William! My lead time is typically 2-3 weeks from when I get the cymbal. That can vary depending on how many other mods I have in my shop. Right now I’m pretty open! reveriedrums.com/shop/p/cymbal-modification
I have one question do any of your cymbals suffer frome the secondary tone syndrome can you make a hexagonal bell what wold that sound like I must know
I refer to them as "hums" or "overtones". I always try to balance the tones so none of them stick out too far above the overall "mix". A hexigon bell would be interesting, but very hard to do in a bronze blank while also forming a good shape in the cymbal.
The 22” came out very nicely, the 19.5” is not something that I would gravitate towards, maybe with a different stick, but an improvement from pre-mod for jazz…what stick were you using here Tim…?
