Sonorlite drums were introduced to the world at the '84 Frankfurt trade show, to cater for drummers looking for a lighter shell weight. The 'lite' shells are made from Scandinavian Silver Birch, which is allegedly so strong yet light that they use it to make airplane frames. It has the reputation of giving a 50% saving in weight relative to its strength. Snare and bass drum shells are constructed from 12 thin plies which makes a well thickness of 7mm. The toms have only nine layers and are consequently 1mm thinner. (Anyone really hanging onto my every word will no doubt be unable to equate these figures either. However these are the dimensions and some plies are obviously thicker than others). All shells are veneered inside with the Birch too and the actual plies are cross-laminated. This means that each alternate veneer is turned through 90°and glued to its neighbours. All this takes place in a special 'former'. Sonor don't use any strengthening rings to keep their shells round since their walls are thick enough anyway to resist the urge to buckle and distort. However, they do make all their shells slightly undersize to affect a timpani-type head seating. This is to ensure that only a very small portion of the plastic head, not its self-hoop or the drum's rim come into contact with the drum's bearing-edge. This edge is bevelled with a 45° angle to allow the head to respond more freely.

As you can see, there is no kit number listed at the top of this 'check'; this is because Sonor no longer list kits. If you want a 24" bass drum with 8" and 15" mounted toms and a 14" floor tom then you can. All you need to do is whisper the numbers into your friendly dealer's ear and he'll take care of the rest of the details. The set I saw was a 22" x 17" bass drum, 13" x 11", 14" x 12" and 16" x 17" toms, a snare drum measuring 14" x 7 ³/₄", a snare stand, hi hat, bass pedal, double tom holder, and two cymbal stands.

The bass drum

Sonor's 'lite' bass drums are all deeper than before, but this particular one known affectionately as LG 22 is an inch deeper than most power basses. It has a pair of wooden hoops which would appear to be made in the same way as the shell itself. 20 large cast nut-boxes are fitted and are exactly as on the Signature and the Sonic sets. (The only difference being that those Sonic sets don't have a plastic seating underneath their casings).

Sonor's nut-boxes have a spring inside to hold their swivel nuts in position, but there's a hefty chunk of foam in there too to stop them from 'singing' in sympathetic resonance with an extraneous note. Ingeniously, the company fit a system to stop their tension rods from de-tuning as you play. It's called 'snap lock' and has flats ground onto the tension screw and a 'D' shaped piece of wire fitted to the aforementioned swivel-nut. The flat part of the 'D' actually penetrates the nut (which retains the tension screw), and once the flat of the screw mates with the flat of the 'D' wire it locks pretty securely. For some strange reason, Sonor don't fit 'snap lock' to their bass drums. The 'T' handled tensioners on these bass drums are the same as the Signature sets, but the claws are made from pressed steel as on the cheaper Phonic sets. Sonor's spurs are extra good. They're made from steel rod and work somewhat in the same way as outrigger-type spurs, ie they fit into a clamp/block which is bolted to the side of the shell. Here the similarity ends though, because the steel rods are bent into a triangle in one plane and into an arc (to enable them to fit snugly against the shell), in the other. The triangle faces forwards, so allows the spikes to face downward too which helps them to dig in when the drum is trying to creep. Both the spur and the leg holder-blocks use a prism clamping system where the round rod is held in a right angled groove machined into the metal. The ends of those spurs, by the way, have optional rubber or spiked ends which can be quickly changed if the floor of your gig dictates it. A knurled nut will hold the rubber foot in place if you so desire.

Tom toms

Sonor are the only company I know of making production floor toms that are deeper than usual. Theirs measures 16" x 17". The other toms are extended too and measure variously 13" x 11" and 14" x 12". The smaller mounted drum has six nut-boxes and tensioners per head while the larger has eight, as has the floor tom. The nut boxes are the same size as the bass drums' and are packed inside with the same foam. Sonor are now the only company without square headed tension screws. Theirs are the type which can be tuned with a screw-driver or, at a pinch, with a coin. Triple flange hoops are fitted to all the drums and Sonor's are superior in that they're made from a single 'plate' of metal. They're formed on the same machine which makes the seamless snare drum shells. They are, as far as I know, much stronger than anybody else's pressed steel ones; certainly I've never seen a broken one. As you'd expect, there are no internal dampers fitted to the toms, but, Sonor make a very good external one which clips to the rim and is adjustable in the normal way. Two sizes are available depending on the degree of damping you need.

The floor tom has the usual three legs which are double bent with rubber feet. Each of the mounted drums has a receiver block fitted to it shell to accommodate the holder arm. These are very substantial and cast with an internal 'tube' which supports the holder-arm inside the drum. I don't think that this piece inside has any adverse affect on the drums' sound in a large drum, but you can normally hear the difference when a tube is inserted into a smaller one. The end of the receiver itself is rhombus shaped where it bolts to the shell and a large 'T' screw serves to lock the drum tightly in the desired position. This screw presses down in turn on a spring-loaded, steel reinforced nylon wedge. Sonor now make a memory jogging pipeclamp for their tom holders, but so far this does not seem to have found its way onto their tom legs.

The snare drum

Only one snare drum is produced for the Sonolite sets. It has a wooden shell and measures 7¼" from head to head. It has no less than 12 double-ended nut-boxes and 24 tension screws complete with 'snap lock'. This drum too has those triple flange hoops but with a difference. The batter hoop is, like the Signature series ones, thicker than the norm. This is to give a stronger sound which I would liken to a Gretsch type hoop. The shell has a slight dip at the snare mechanism positions to allow the 24 strand wire snares to seat more evenly. The on/off mechanism has been fitted to Sonor's drums for quite some time but it's been up-dated a bit. Basically, it's a cast cam action strainer with adjustable tension and screw operated jaws to clamp the string or plastic strip which is secured to the snares. The butt end is adjustable too on a sort of hinge but, what is new, is the roller outrigger which is situated below both of those units. This allows an extra long snare to be used and means that the wires lay right across the head from bearing edge to bearing edge. (Normal snares tend to allow the butts, those pieces of metal or plastic which contain the wires, to rest on the head and deaden the tone a little.) There is another mechanism available should you need it which is the same parallel action to be found on the Signature snare drums. Like the toms this drum has no internal dampers, simply an external one.

Right that's about it for the drums themselves, but how do they sound? The toms were fitted with see-through Ambassador heads both top and bottom; the bass drum, too, had two of these while the snare drum had a coated Ambassador batter and one of Remo's medium-thin Ambassador snare heads. The extra-depth of all the shells allows the fundamental to become more audible with a thicker shell drum like (say) a Signature. But, when you use a lighter shell the highs of the sound and its overtones tend to 'cut through' while still maintaining that fundamental. This makes the drum a little less round in tone with more bang, and rumour has it that heavy players are buying Lite for this increased audibility within the band. I was impressed by the floor tom, the extra inch in the shell makes it very interesting to play. It's just a bit stronger. The bass drum had more edge and audibility than I expected and cut through very nicely thank you. Sonor have always had a knack of making very good snare drums; this one is no exception. It has a very 'breathy' sound with lots of brightness from its snares but none of the 'zonk' invariably associated with drums over 6½" deep. It really is very responsive but possibly won't be perfect for 'Heavy Metal'. (I'd suggest a metal shell drum for that particular application).

Accessories

The tubes, nuts, bolts and things of the accessories supplied with the Sonorlite sets are not generally as heavy as those of the Signature series. However, they're pretty substantial: the hi hat is numbered Z 5474 and has an external spring for its centre-pull action which is mounted in an adjustable chamber outside the down tube. Its legs are tripod type and double strutted like those on the other stands, but are fitted with Sonor's old screw-adjustable, lockable, rubber or spiked end sections. There's a cast two piece, black-crackle finish foot-plate to match the bass drum pedal and a saddle type toe stop. As I said, this hi hat has a centre-pull mechanism which has a metal strap to join it to the centre section. Height adjustment has the usual spring steel clamp and the top rod section is made from hexagonal section stainless steel. It matches up, of course, with the hole in the hi hat clutch and is meant to stop the top cymbal from rotating unnecessarily.

Sonor make just three bass drum pedals these days and the one supplied with the Lite sets, or rather recommended for them is the old Z 5370. It's the middle of the range model with twin, black crackle finish posts, a two piece cast foot-plate with toe stop and a nylon strap which is adjustable to change the footplate angle without moving the position of the beater. The stroke is changeable on a cam which is attached to a large 'drum' roller; this is to gear down the action and make it even smoother. Three expansion springs are supplied in different strengths and these are, as per usual, adjustable a little more once fixed to the pedal. It's a piece of cake to attach the unit to the bass drum hoop from the more dignified seating position since it sports an extra long 'T' screw tapped directly into the 'U' shaped cast frame.

Otherwise, Z 5370 has a pair of sprung, screw-adjustable spurs fitted to the frame's bottom and a pear shaped, well balanced felt beater. Like the hi hat, I had no complaints before; it has a very smooth, and nicely engineered action.

The snare drum stand I saw is numbered Z 5570. It has a large flat steel, double strutted base with large rubber feet and utilises an adjustable basket system to hold its drum securely in position and has a quick-release arm to allow you to remove it. The height adjustment arrest uses one of Sonor's pressed steel clamps complete with plastic wear resisting insert, while the playing-angle arrest is simply accomplished by squashing two pieces together in a sort of sandwich. (The 'bread' of the sandwich is attached to the basket, while the 'filling' is created by squashing together the very end of the down-tube). As usual, the ends of the basket holders are bent at right-angles and sheathed in rubber, and when you first set the drum up you can tighten those arms against the rim by using a large thumbscrew.

Two cymbal stands are included in the price you see at the top of the page. One straight one and the other with a boom. The former is Z 5270 and the latter 5273. Needless to say their bases and tubed sections are exactly the same. They have the same double-strutted legs with the finest three stages exactly the same. Your actual tubes are the same diameter too. The top of the final tube is reduced a little and the cast, splined ratchet tilter is fitted there. Sonor fit an extra long filter rod which is, as usual, threaded to accommodate all the gubbins to protect the cymbal and indeed, keep it from falling off. The boom stand has a fourth stage which locates into the top where the filter would normally be.

Conclusion

It's ironic to me that Sonor, the company who more or less single-handedly pioneered extra thick drum shells, should be the finest to realise that all drummers did not want the round, clean sounds produced by them. So, they've gone a long way towards redressing the balance. As I mentioned earlier, guys sometimes want drums to go 'bang' instead of 'boom'. As you may no doubt have noticed, these drums ain't cheap, but they are very much in the same quality mould as the Signature series sets at roughly half the price. The finish of drums and equipment was as usual impeccable. (I've written before that it's the attention to detail that makes them look so good. Metalware is always polished prior to being chromed). The set which I saw at Pro Percussion in Camden Town was a natural wood one which looked a little like Bird's Eye Maple, but if you don't fancy that you can specify a thickly lacquered white or Onyx. That last finish should look great with Sonor's brand new system of colouring the stands and all other metalware black.

SONORLITE FIVE PIECE - RRP: £1750