The lugs and most of the cool wraps were discontinued as well. That’s 4 years after they stopped making the President kits. Phenolic shells weren’t mentioned by Pearl until 1977. There is one thing that has me scratching my head. There will be more to come on that snare very soon. It’s a 3rd & 4th 6x14 zebra wood/maple/zebra wood snare with an Evans calftone head. The snare being used is one I recently finished building. Honestly, I think I was too lazy to put them on when I first got this kit. I did'n’t bothered to put reso heads on them. This kit is equipped with Evans frosted EC2 on toms and Evans frosted EQ4 on bass. I’d love to get my hands on either of those to try out. Pearl also utilized these shells for Vari-Pitch cannons and Vari-Pitch snare drums. They have sharp edges, will never go out of round and have a very thunderous tone to them. They were hand wrapped around precision molds to produce a shell of uniform thickness. The only thing I can tell you about them is they are synthetic. Secondly, these shells are neither plastic fiber glass or cheap mahogany. It just says Pearl Japan. It’s missing the word President. First thing you notice is that my badge is different. Something does make this kit a little different than the ones printed on the pages. Based on this information (warp/badge/lugs/metal bass drum hoops) I put my kit somewhere in the late 60s/early 70s. They still offered great looking pearl wraps such as this Tiger Eye white pearl, marine pearl and gold grain pearl. These President kits were built till 1973. In the 1969 catalogue the "President” kit was the only one to show a rectangle badge with the words president on them. The other drum models were made out of “non-warping hard shells” which we all know to be luan mahogany. The “President” were still the only line being made out of plastic fiber claiming to be weather resistant, giving you more tone and were perfectly round. They all came with metal hoops with pearl inlays as well. 2 years later (1969) Pearl decided to make all their entire drum catalog with their diamond cut lugs. This catalog only showed their silver scripted badges. They were set apart by their attractive styled “diamond cut” lugs while the other lines had Slingerland “inspired” lugs. One of them being the President Outfit (No. Just like Yamaha Pearl wanted to take things a little further.Įven though they have been making drums since the 50’s in 1967, Pearl introduced 10 drum set configurations. To name a few, here are names Pearl made drums under: Lido Supreme, American Custom, Apollo, Whitehall, Cooper, Astro and ZimGar. There are over 100 names associated with them. I’d like to first clarify that it’s very hard to come by good information about vintage MIJ drums. This Pearl President drum kit is one of them. Some are made the same while others are more than what they seem. I guess you can see why most were often neglected and, more than likely, just thrown away. The shells can be out of round and their hardware can break easily. Purchasing a vintage made in Japan drum kit can be a gamble.