This is old news. Most people aren't looking for a whole drum, but just a part.

I am totally against parting out a perfectly good drum, orphan or not. If the shell is damaged beyond repair, then I am ok with parting it out, otherwise, leave it be and sell it as the drum that it deserves to be rather than a pile of parts.

While WADSMOE is absolutely correct that "the sum of the parts.....etc", I agree with L-D. It is a shame to see prefectly good drums parted out. There are a couple of ebay sellers who obviously do this as their first choice...get a great drum and take it apart to sell the pieces. It's like parting out an original 55 Chevy...ugh!! (Of course, I'm guilty of buying some of those parts so I guess I'm encouraging such behavior.)

Exactly!! That's really where I'm going with this topic; No, don't strip down your best Chevy, but if someone wrecked the Chevy you'd "cannibalize" the carcass. Car Driving2 Likewise, if you can't recoup your $ from an investment, liquidate and re-invest. Of course, as usual, the purists will sit back and swear not to cut into such a noble instrument, which is why they are purists. When there is a demand, there will be a follow-up supply; your P-83 has to come from somewhere...oh, that reminds me...

I'm not a collector and I'm certainly not a purist. But, this is just icky. Why would you take a perfectly playable drum and rip it apart (part it out)? That makes absolutely no sense. If it's a money thing, then make better decisions prior to investing into the gear. How much money could you possibly lose with one orphan drum? We are only talking about a little bit - less than a hundred fifty for sure. That's not much money for a lesson to be learned. If you have a garage full of orphans you paid too much for, then you have a completely different lesson to learn. If it's only a single or even a couple of drums, no big deal. Take the hit and keep the drums sane. Dang man. Killing a drum for a couple of bucks...that is just wrong.

Parting out an orphan drum, as bad as it is in my opinion, pales against "cannibalizing" a kit of drums that have remained together as a kit for many years.

There are plenty a Cannibals doing this already that are supplying us with plenty of parts.

There are no orphan drums, they are just temporarily in between homes.

This is a poor choice of arenas in which to voice this practice, in my opinion.

Poor choice of arenas? Not sure I understand the meaning.

We see lots of greedy goobers breaking up kits to maximize profit on Ebay. Sure, somebody can find that floor tom or mounted tom to add to his pieced together kit, but how much better it would be for us to pass these kits around intact. But, I guess I'm stuck in the 80's-90's when vintage drum collecting was beginning and there seemed to be a greater appreciation for keeping kits together---for history as much as for value.

Yes, there were singles on the market, and there was always a need to add to an incomplete set, but parts were rarely "stolen" from a perfectly good or restorable drum in my experience.

I mean that of all places to suggest taking parts from good drums or separating drums from kits, this forum would be a poor choice of locations.

And it's for the reasons you stated..........:)