Drum Isolation
These are methods of mounting the drums of a drumset so that the mounting does not interfere with the ability of the drum to resonate freely. Essentially we want the drum to behave and sound as if it is simply floating in mid air
It used to be the case that
all toms had a mount attached directly to the shell. Worse still, many manufacturers cut
a hole in the shell and had a suspension arm entering the body of the drum itself as
well as having a mounting bracket on the shell. If you have spent a long time
searching for your drum kit and evaluating shell woods and thicknesses, depths,
head selection and assuming that you want your drums to deliver the tones that
you have tuned them to generate, then you will want the drums to resonate as
freely as possible.
For rack toms there are essentially two variations that do
this, both are based on the same principle.
RIMS
Suspension mounts that fit
around the drum shell and attached to about half of a drum's tension rods. This kind of mount sits under the hoop so that there is no
contact with the shell.
ISS
These fit to the hoop
itself. There is some discussion about the pressure of the drum on the hoop and how that may affect the sound.
My personal preference primarily for the sake of concenience, is to use the ISS mount as it is smaller and more
easily changed. Loosen two or three lugs and the unit can be adjusted or removed. whereas with RIMS you are obliged to de-tune the drum and remove the
tension rods to take the mount off. I have one set of ISS mounts that I
exchange between my two primary kits.
Floor toms should also be
freely mounted. Instead of having leg mounts attached to the shell, there are solutions which attach to the tuning lugs, RIMS again do this, but this time they fit to the bottom of the drum between the hoop
and the lugs and floor tom legs fit to the rim.
One word about the RIMS floor
tom mounts though, you will need to buy a case about 2" bigger than the diameter
of the drum as they increase the physical diameter of the drum's footprint, I
have my 14" tom in a 16" case.
About isolating drums
There are important decisions to be made regarding the way that a drummer mounts the various elements of their drum kit. A snare drum stand for example
normally has a snare sitting in and on rubber in a cradle or basket; drummers tend to tighten the basket around the bottom hoop of the snare in such a manner that the snare and stand
can be lifted as one unit by just lifting the snare.
Doing this can easily 'choke' the
bottom head of the snare and the shell itself, making the drum less responsive
and not representing the snare sound that you tuned it to deliver. A snare
should rest on the protective rubber and the basket claws tightened sufficiently
so that it will not fall out of the cradle but enough that it will still be held
in place.
If bringing out the full
sound of a well presented drum kit is a priority then the kick drum should not be used as a
holder for the rack toms, instead they can be mounted using the isolation mounts above on a rack or on stands.
The front of the bass drum should be angled off the floor slightly (1"-2"), thus raising the whole base of the kick off the floor so that it is not being muffled
by the carpet or other floor surface on which the drum is placed.
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