Restored 1974, Premier “2000” Snare Drum (#1). Hoops and heads, and re-fitting the snare wires

I’ve been completely sidetracked with other projects, and with my gut-snared, Premier “1026” snare fitting right into my current practice setup – I’ve let things slip on my three “2000” snare projects. Time to put that to rights…

I’ve managed to acquire a few different throw-off levers, and butt end casings for my builds. This, #1 refurbishment, arrived mostly complete – but was missing the entire throw-off lever assembly, and the butt-end piece was a little bit knocked about. Since the rest of the drum is in quite good, original condition – I may as well take the opportunity to re-assign some of the various end plates, and swap around some of the internal components to replace particularly worn parts.

When you take them apart – the throw-off and butt-side casings are virtually the same. The only real difference is with the actual lever – which is mounted on top of the throw-off casing. The lever is held in place, and pivots, using a threaded pin which passes through the top of the casing. This also holds the internal mechanism in place, and secures the casing onto the end of the Flobeam. I’ve selected the casings which are in best overall condition for this drum – however, I’ve swapped out both of the tensioner springs, since they are showing signs of corrosion. One of the tensioner knobs is also swapped out, because the original showed a few knocks and scrapes.

To dis-assemble each unit – the threaded pin through the top of the assembly is unscrewed and withdrawn. (Don’t, whatever you do, lose this pin. Put it back in place once you’ve removed the other bits and pieces. This will save you having to search the workshop floor on your knees). Removing the pin releases the lever on the throw-off casing, and also takes out the top pivot point for the internal, T-shaped components which sit inside the casings at both sides of the snare mechanism. (I don’t know the real name of these important castings – I’ll call it them “snare actioners”). The actioners are still currently held in place, however, by means of the strainer adjustment nuts. These knurled knobs can now be unscrewed, and this releases the captive tensioner springs – as well as the actioners.

Once both casings have been dis-assembled – all chrome exterior parts are cleaned with Autosol Chrome cleaner, before being polished up with a soft cloth. The internal components, and the insides of the mouldings are also given a good clean out, using WD-40 and various poking, scrubbing and scouring materials, as necessary. An old toothbrush comes in handy, and there are also cases for using 0000 grade wire wool, or alternatives, if there are signs of corrosion or general dried-on grot. However – these casings being the pair in the best condition – they’re already quite clean, and only require minimum attention. Once I’ve cleaned the interior parts – and especially if I’ve used any WD-40 – I always wipe the cleaned parts over with a rag, which has a little machine oil soaked into it. (Gun oil smells nice, and seems to do the job well enough – without the tendency to leave too many fingermarks). It’s important to remember that WD-40 isn’t really a lubricant. It’s a cleaner and solvent. It eases up stuck parts because it un-gunks, gunked-up oil and grease. You need to get a light coating of oil onto the surface of the metal parts to resist corrosion in the longer term, and all components should always be oiled or greased before any re-assembly. Exposed chromed parts don’t need oiling in the same way. There – the chrome does the work of protecting the metal, and as long as the chrome is kept clean – and polished regularly – it shouldn’t corrode or pit.

The two “snare actioners” are the business-ends of the whole snare operating system. Consequently – it’s where you might expect to find wear and tear due to repetitive use. It’s a simple enough component. The moulding has a threaded shaft riveted through a central opening in the casting, and this creates the link to the tensioner knob outside each casing. The pivot lug at the top, (or bottom, as shown on the image above), has an unlikely “kink” in it’s placement. At first look – it’s almost looks as if the moulding has perhaps bent due to stress – but it’s supposed to look like that. This component warrants careful cleaning and inspection before assembly – but a word of caution…

…The two threaded screws with the narrow necks. They hold the snare wires in place, and act as fine adjusters for the snares’ proper placement against the bottom reso head. These are notoriously the cause of many players “giving-up entirely” with the 2000 snare – simply because the fine adjustments are “tricky”. The general received wisdom on the 2000 snare adjustment seems to be – “it’s all pre-set in the factory… don’t, whatever you do, EVER touch those screws again”.

Naturally – if you’re rebuilding a “2000”, or perhaps restoring one from different parts – there’s no way of knowing if any adjustment screw is still in its’ ideal, “pre-set” condition, or not. It’s more than likely that the whole rigmarole of setting the snares properly in place will ultimately have to be dealt with, one way or another. That’s the case with all three of my builds – there’s simply no avoiding it. I’m going to have to try and find a copy of Premier’s original setup tips, (which used to come with each drum), and see if I can work out a logical process, through trial and error. The best I can do for now, is to try and keep the screws as close to their current positions as possible – and then hope the previous owners didn’t mess things around too much. Of course – ideally – the screws need cleaning and re-lubricating, along with everything else. Since I want to try and maintain their current positions – I count the number of threads visible above and below the T-bar on the actioners, and note it down – before attempting any removal.

Now for the other really important bit:- The narrow necks of these screws are notoriously fragile. If a screw is bound in the thread, due to any sort of corrosion – the torque from a screwdriver can be enough to snap the neck – leaving you a screw short, and with a useless actioner, with a broken grub screw stuck in it. If you can get the broken bit out of the moulding – it is sometimes possible to find replacements. I have even occasionally seen modern, steel replacement “upgrades” offered for sale – but do yourself a favour to begin with… don’t snap the screw necks!.

As a precaution – not knowing how well lubricated the adjustment screws are – I use WD-40 to soak the threads for a while, before removal. Once the screws have been cleanly withdrawn, everything can be properly cleaned and then re-lubricated again. I usually oil the insides of any threads with a wipe of gun oil, as part of a general “re-lubrication”, (and especially after any cleaning with WD-40). A little extra dab of lithium grease on each screw, as it’s returned to its’ original position, helps keep things slippy and protected in the longer term. If you can keep corrosion away entirely by lubricating the screws adequately – it should, (theoretically at least), be less risky to turn them again, during any subsequent process of adjustment.

Finally – once both actioners have been cleaned and re-assembled – both end assemblies can then be re-built – by following the dis-assembly process, in reverse. They’ll have to come apart again for attachment to the shell – but I find that this sort of approach helps keep things together. With my eyesight the way it is – I’ve wasted far too much time looking for parts I’ve just casually “set aside”.

This particular “2000” came to me also missing its’ original batter head – although both hoops were present. Both needed quite a bit of cleaning – with Autosol Chrome cleaner and some ultra-fine 0000 grade wire wool helping to remove some of the more stubborn spots of rust and oxidation. The problem areas are usually around the lugs – where moisture and grot can get trapped behind the heads of the tension rods. Both hoops here shine up really well for their age – with just a few more marks and knocks evident to the snare side hoop, which has the characteristic snare protector surrounds set into the casting. These die-cast, “beer barrel” Premier hoops play a big part in the look and sound of vintage Premier kits, and they can often be found on the used “parts” market – for those looking for replacements, or even upgrade from the triple-flange alternatives. (Although snare-side ones appear to be much harder to come by). The, more flexible, triple flange hoops are often preferred by players who want to accentuate the piched resonances of their drums – wheras the stiffer, heavier cast hoops are supposed to produce some of the classic “thud” of vintage setups. In the case of the “2000” snare – the die-cast hoops are a characteristic feature of it’s modern, “streamlined” design.

With both hoops cleaned and polished – I then fit a set of white, nylon, sleeved washers, to help isolate and protect the metal-to-metal contact points between hoop and tension rods. These are supposed to also help maintain tuning stability, and I always tend to use some sort of additional nylon washer on most of my rebuilds, as a matter of course. These threaded ones, by Hendrix Drums, have little moulded sleeves, which are also supposed to protect and isolate each rod as it passes through the hoop. There are still a few, small casting bumps, and bits of metal frass evident in some of the rod holes. These need cleaning up and paring away with a tapered, rat-tail file, before the sleeves can pass into the holes without deformation. They’re a really tight fit – but as long as they’re not pinched in at any point – the rods should pass through, and do their job, unhindered.

All I need now, to re-assemble the drum, is a pair of heads. I’m using Remo heads again – a Coated CS, (Controlled Sound), on the batter side, paired with a “hazy” Ambassador snare reso. The drum originally had an original, (but slightly damaged), Premier “Everplay” reso – but I’ve got a few of these Ambassador “hazy” alternatives set aside. (The Everplay head got recycled onto my “1026” rebuild). The hazy resos are quite often found in “snare packs” from Remo, together with a few, different batter alternatives. They seem to be a standard, Ambassador-weight reso, and I’ve paired this one with one of Remo’s “CS”, snare batter heads. I’ve used CS batters on the other drums of my 70’s Premier “Elite” practice kit – where they approximate the sound and “look” of Premier’s clear “donut” batters from the 70’s and 80’s. This snare head is, however, coated for brushes – with the “dot” applied to the reverse – visible as a slightly darker circle, in the centre of the head.

So – now to re-assemble the drum. First – the end casings need to be re-attached to the Flowbeam…

Butt-end first… I need to dis-assemble each casing first, but then the process is reasonably straightforward, and is virtually identical at both sides. The only tricky bit is getting the “actioner” to sit properly in place whilst the casing is pushed onto the end of the Flowbeam itself. It helps to sit the drum shell upside-down, and to hold the curved end of the T-shaped actioner in place, in the little semi-circular depression at the end of the beam. The housing piece is then pushed onto the end of the beam – so that the tensioner screw piece protrudes through the hole in the centre of the casing, and the path of the securing pin-hole lines up with the path at the tip of the actioner, inside. That’s the main tricky bit – but once you’ve managed it a few times – it’s easy enough. It helps to lubricate the end of the beam before pushing the end casing into place, and it’s essential to have previously cleaned and oiled the securing pin – which is pushed through the casing, the actioner, and out of the other side of the casing – before being turned in its’ threads, to secure it in place.

Check that the actioner pivots correctly, and that the casing is properly anchored. Then – the tensioner spring can be placed over the end of the protruding screw, and the tensioner knob rotated and tightened to compress the spring, and pull the actioner into position. I’ve lubricated the threads of the tensioner screw, before fitting the knob, and now I can check it’s operation. As the spring is compressed – the actioner pivots outwards – swinging it’s bottom end away from the shell of the drum. Once the snare wires are in place – you can see how both tensioner knobs can – together – position and centralise the snare, as well as pull the wires taughter, as required.

The lever-end casing goes on in exactly the same manner – except in this case – the lever itself is also fixed in place, as the securing pin is threaded through. The lever pivots against the shell of the drum via a couple of rounded lugs, and these need to locate into the special cut-outs, on one of the external end caps – installed as part of the Flowbeam assembly. In the image above you might be able to see how the whole mechanism works. Moving the lever up or down works on the lever pivot which, in turn, moves the whole end assembly either up or down. Because the end assemblies are, essentially, tied together by the Flobeam – when one moves – the other side moves in parallel. In a well-adjusted and well-lubricated system – the movement is positive, (with a definite “knock” for on and off), but the motion is quick, smooth and even. Most importantly – there should be no “play” in the movement at either limit. The idea of the whole mechanism is to affect the snare wires equally, along their entire length, as the throw-off is operated. Movement should be a simple on/off selection – with each end moving the exact same distance. The Flobeam is cleverly designed to achieve this with just the simple up/down selection of the “2000 ” snare’s “beer-tap” lever.

The batter head is installed in the usual manner. The head is centralised and secured with the hoop in place, over the top. Original, cleaned and re-conditioned, slotted-head tension rods are used – to complete the authentic look and operation. The rods used are the shorter type of the various slotted rods produced by Premier – approximately 2 inches in length overall. 8 rods for the top head – 16 in total, and I’m using the variant which have only a short, threaded end. These display a smooth, chromed shaft between hoop and lug when installed, and are preferable to the “Olympic” and “Beverley” alternatives, which are turned all along their length. It would be a shame to spoil the handsome looks of all that streamlined chrome, with the wrong choice of tension rods. Admittedly, they’d function exactly the same – but the “2000” snare is all about that polished chrome. Once all eight rods are installed – they’re tightened in pairs – diagonally, and around the drum – until each rod is just at finger tightness. I’ll be tensioning the heads and adjusting the snare wires later and, for those interested how I get on with fine-adjusting the infamous 2000 snare – I will attempt to cover all in a later post…

The reso head is then installed in exactly the same manner, and the tension rods are, once again, tightened just to “finger-tight”.

Although an original set of snare wires was still in place on the drum – there was a slight twist to the set. I’ll try to re-use them on another build, and source another set for use here. The “2000” snare series requires a special set of snare wires to fit between the four snare post screws on the end casings. Fortunately – plenty were in production by Premier throughout the 1960’s/70’s/80’s and 90’s, and there are still, occasional supplies of NOS, (new, old stock), snares on the spare parts market. You might also strike lucky, and find a pair of “Double 10” snares, which are also suppose to work – the snares split into two, separately soldered bands – each fitting between each support post pair. Puresound also used to make a few, special, custom snare sets specifically for the “2000” series – but I’m not sure if these are still in production. Amazon “doesn’t know” when these Puresound snares will be in stock next. That usually means, “no longer in production”.

I’ve sourced an NOS set of Premier snare wires, (probably 1990’s stock) – 24 wires in total, with the soldered-on end tabs drilled to hook over the “2000’s” snare post supports, and slot against the narrowed sections of the grub screws discussed above. When fitting the snare wires – set the throw-off lever to “off” first – (and it helps to slacken off both tensioner screws) – before dropping the tabs into place at each end, in turn. The tensioners can then be re-tightened, to stretch the snare wires out to a nominal setting – adjusting each as required – keeping the snare wires centrally placed, over the width of the snare bed.

Of course, the snare wires should thread through the cast protectors at each side of the lower hoop. Also – be aware that setting the throw lever to “on again, will bring the wires into direct contact with the reso head, and the bottom rim of the drum shell. Since the bearing edge is slightly swept below its’ normal line here, and since the reso head is still relatively slack – clamping it down with the wires whilst the head is untensioned may, feasibly, cause a kink the mylar, and weaken it a little. Either adjust the snare tension so it isn’t quite as tight against the reso, (but enough to keep it on the posts) – or keep the throw in the “off” position, for now. At least until the relative tensions and spacings are properly adjusted, in the eventual setup.

As with most of my project builds – I do like to provide a suitable case for the finished instrument, and I’ve gradually put together a small collection of vintage Premier hard cases. The distinctive red, fibreboard and rivet type – (very similar to vintage LeBlond cases in look and construction, but instead with a distinctive “magenta” colour and screenprinted, 70’s Premier logo). However – most of Premier’s usual “snare” cases won’t, apparently, fit some Premier snare drums. With the end casings and slightly protruding lugs – the final diameter of the “2000” snare is actually closer to 16″, instead of the “14” usually “quoted” on the spec sheet. The dimensions of the Lokfast system tom mounts, as seen on my other “Elite” drums, causes a similar problem. A 14″ tom, with it’s attachment block and square winged adjustment nut in place, means you’re lucky if a 14″ tom fits in a 17″ case. If a seller says it’s a 14″ Premier snare case – just double check it’s a case made for a 14″ Premier snare, and not just a 14″ Premier case. If you get the chance – check the dimensions first. Don’t just go by what the previous owner may have kept in it.

Having learned the hard way – by trial and error, I now know that a “2000” snare like this one, will best fit a case measuring 17″ across the lid, (you might also probably get away with a 16″ – but I’d like to allow just a little bit of extra space to fit a ring of thin foam padding around the inner). I sourced a really nice example in virtually “as new” condition – minus just it’s original strap. I’m always on the lookout for original parts and replacements, but it’s pretty rare that just the straps come up for sale, on their own. I have an old nylon-buckled replacement hanging around the workshop which does the required job – but even these are now getting harder to find too.

The drum fits well for diameter and depth. I’ll source some 1.0cm foam padding, or similar, and pad the whole of the inner of the lower shell – so that the drum remains well protected. A slightly oversized piece of foam in the top lid should remain in place on its’ own, without need to glue it, or tape it permanently. This will completely enclose the drum in foam padding, once the case is closed, and strapped shut.