Alafia Abure Sonorlite!
I hope that you are well!
Okay, I happen to be one of those people referred to, lovingly I'm sure in brother B-mac's post, who like to mount the crowns a bit close (about 1/4") to the playing surface. Eh! It takes a bit of getting used to, and applying a somewhat different attack on the conga, but I do.
Okay, enough about that.....I wound up mounting a set of skins once, in fact they were on my Islas too, and when they cured/dried, they were a bit too high even for my taste. Here's what I did, and some of you will probably cringe at the sound of it....I tuned them to a relatively high pitch, not too high though. I then put a wet wash cloth on the drum head. I folded the corners to make sure that none of the cloth was hanging over the side of the head. I then took a small cup of water and poured a bit more onto the cloth (I repeated this process throughout the day/night which either you are able to do). I made sure that the water gradually absorbed into the head/skin, after a bit....I would take the cloth off and tap the head to check if it was dampened enough to stretch. Knowing that I had tuned it prior to beginning this process, I could tell that the head was ready to stretch more, I would then tighten each tension rod just a bit more (bringing the tune of the drum back up).
I repeated this until I reached the distance (crown to playing surface) that I wanted. Be warned though that the skin will look somewhat nasty in this process, but it's only temporary. When the whole process is done, it will go back to the nice color and texture that you originally had.
Then of course, if this doesn't sound like something you would try doing, there's always remounting the heads (soaking them in warm water for an hour or two), making sure that the flesh hoop doesn't fall out, then remounting them and tightening them to the point that you are content. Or.......you could just start from scratch......(see pics)
Stay well!
Onile!
- started with a skin purchased from Isaac @ JCR
- using brother Olsongo's technique....