Andy Chase

I decided to start on the square hole through the hand drum, where the dowel stick will pass through at the neck joint.

Gaffe number one: I drilled the hole on the opposite side of the rim than I had originally intended; I wanted the Remo graphic to be at the tailpiece end of the instrument; it would have been a little less prominent, and it would also have placed the seam of the cheesy fake walnut veneer around the outside of the drum at the neck joint, hiding it completely. As the saying goes, measure twice, cut once.

I'm not all that upset about it... it won't affect tone in any way, and I'm probably the only person that will notice (or care) about the position of the logo.

I drilled a small pilot hole, then drilled a larger, 1/2" hole. The dowel stick will be about 3/4" at the wide end, so I wanted to be conservative. Next I tried to cut the corners of the hole with a coping saw, but I didn't feel like I had enough control that way. I'll probably finish the hole with files.

Upon drilling through it, I discovered that the drum shell is made of very dense cardboard, like the stuff you usually find in rolls of carpeting. I wonder how Remo mounts the head on these drums.