We restored this German Sonor Drumset from the 70s!

In this episode we restored a Sonor Champion set from the early 70s.
It was in bad condition because it was stored in the attic for many years, but check out how amazing it turned out!
ATTENTION!
Unfortunately we made a mistake in the video:
The blue color was actually an original finish used by Sonor in the early 70s.
Red and green sets were also available with this inside and outside stain.
However, these sets were primarily build for schools and are relatively rare these days.
Send us an email or check our webshop for a personal offer for the restoration of your drumset!
www.stdrums.com
For the old catalogues as well as the most detailled collection of information on old Sonor drums please check out: www.sonormuseum.de/
Thanks to Rolf for providing the catalogues and to Sonor for letting us use the pictures!

[@kushking420]

Love it, great work, always nice to see a vintage Sonor being restored

[@sweetdragon36067]

Last year I sold a vintage 1980 Sonor set and know someone is enjoying it with the richest sound and double rosewood.

[@jcollins1305]

Beautiful job gentlemen! Nice to see a beautiful old set of drums get a new lease on life. Cheers from the USA 🇺🇸

[@CootaDrums]

This is dope !

[@RyoCanCan]

Now I want a set of old Sonors 😩

[@Juanvanemmerloot]

WOW!!!!!! What a great video and what a cool job you guys are doing!

[@jayweb702]

Excellent work!

[@TC-lk2ev]

That looks amazing. Nice work.

[@nickjones252]

Fantastic job! Looks great. Bravo. 😀😀

[@almart8991]

Great video. Thanks

[@gcorriveau6864]

I just found your channel by accident as I am experimenting with a project to convert an old snare drum into a pancake snare and maybe also a 'frame' drum with the left-over shell. That's a very cool restoration. Have you ever renewed an old Trixon kit? I must go to your page and look.

[@stdrumsgmbh]

Yes sometimes we also work on Trixon kits, but recently not so much because they are pretty rare, however we might have a chance to make a Trixon video in the future ;)

[@scmcarthur]

great video!

[@Onlyfamoli]

look amazing

[@anthonydratnal1870]

From what I've seen on Sonor Museum and elsewhere, the Champion name was changed to Super Champion in 1976, and sometime later that year the bearing edge was changed to the 45 degree of the Phonic but the shells were still 6-ply beech. Interestingly, my Super Champion kit has the same mounts as the one in this video, 6 ply toms with round bearing edges, but a 9-ply kick still with a round bearing edge. A very interesting combination which I haven't seen anywhere else - maybe it was a custom order.

[@stdrumsgmbh]

thanks a lot for the info! It totally makes sense!

[@rolandedrummer9723]

ooh wee my favorite

[@JirForce]

Nice job! The only thing that could be done better is the badge i think. Those nails sticking out the other side and the wood splintered is a little bit sad looking

[@DougBrito]

I'm Curious about the sound of theses drums!! 🥁👏👏🥁🥁 Looks amazing!

[@joaogaspar9155]

Of course, they should have banged the hell out of it!

[@florian8020]

Beautiful!! How is the sound of this one? I never heard a professional recording of vintage sonor drums knowingly. But I know how my past teardrop sounds on recording :)

[@stanfordkoch1271]

You polished the chrome with just steel whool and wd-40?

[@stdrumsgmbh]

yes, but mostly fine steel whool is enough. We just used the WD40 on very hard dry rusty places of the BD hoops. All the lugs, mounts and tomhoops were polished using only steel whool

[@PirateNightsuN]

looks great but a bit dissapointing that you didn't hit the damn thing

[@JayDeLarge]

thanks! sorry about that our recording setup is slowly growing and we hope to include more sound demos in future restoration videos 😁

[@user-yo8jv2cv2o]

Did vintage Sonors usually have the rubber gaskets under the lugs like this? Did you just cut them out yourself from a sheet? Thanks!

[@stdrumsgmbh]

the vintage Sonors of that era didn't have the rubber gaskets. Signature had vulcanic fibre (check our latest video on the topic) in the same shape. We have a special punching tool and a large punching machine for these rubber gaskets so they come out even. You can find them in our webshop under the name "gasket lite"

[@HuckFinn212]

Bumbewasserzang, as wecall it 🤣👍

[@Drumdre]

How does it Sound tho?

[@stdrumsgmbh]

the customer added his own heads later, so we could not go for a testride in the video. But we will upload more sound demos of custom projects like this in the future ;)

[@snarlingrabiddog5150]

That bug died for his music.

[@mbernier59]

Schee!

[@user-dw4qm2on3b]

Hi! This model looks exactly like soviet- made drumsets called "Tacton". They were made during the soviet occupation of the eastern part of Germany, where soviets stole the factories from Sonor and started making those poor quality Tacton. Tacton were one of the best drum brands in the soviet union, as well as Czech Amati and Latvian RMIF.

[@stdrumsgmbh]

Hi Thanks for the comment! That is very interesting! There are really cuite a few design similarities between these old Tacton drums!

[@markcoyle6878]

Drum look great pity about the regular nails to attach the badges. They just ruined the inside of the shell. Not very professional

[@popeyesailor9571]

Sonor tom mounts are easy to find. puttting toms onsnare stands is horrible and sucks all the tone out.

[@johnbentley3504]

How much is to pay for Restauration 3 pcs kit??

[@stdrumsgmbh]

it depends a lot on the drum sizes and what work we have to do. In the case of the video the restoration including veneers and polishing all the hardware landed somewhere around 1000€ but many customers do the polishing themselves to save a bit money. You can contact us via email for a personal offer