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Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Tue Feb 22, 2011 6:06 pm
by skinslapper
I live in Holland witch hase a reasenable climate for wooden conga's/bongo's with real skins.
But i am planning on moving to the Islas Canarias witch have a subtropical climat .
I know weather hase influence on drums and skins, keep 'm out of the sun etc.

What R the do's & dont's for wooden drums with natural skins in a subtropical climat ???

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Tue Feb 22, 2011 6:42 pm
by Anonimo
POST REMOVED BY THE AUTHOR

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:32 am
by Derbeno
Just came back from tropical Curacao, I made a point of checking with three long time pros. They all give me the look of 'what's the fuss???"
They simply tune their drums when they need to. LP Classic with the stock cowskin is the weapon of choice there.

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Wed Feb 23, 2011 5:44 pm
by TONE74
When I first started a couple of years ago I read about the untuning after playing then tuning again. Did it for about 6 months and then said f**k it and now just do it when I need to. I don't see what the big deal is my drums still sound good to my ears.

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 4:48 pm
by s'chopp
:shock: Tone74 you have commited percussive blasphemy please wash out your mouth with soap !

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 9:03 pm
by skinslapper
It's a free world . Don't forget that !!!

I live in holland and my + - 25 years old Supercussion conga's have never been downtuned .
And the still sound great with the original skins on them .

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Thu Mar 21, 2013 5:48 pm
by 11am
When touring with Vicky Sue Robinson ( Turn the Beat Around) in the winter months in the 70"s, we did a gig in Chicago , and then had to fly to Miami the next day, I forgot to detune the Quinto, which I always did before flights. Got to Miami and the heat in the cargo hold got so intense it ripped the skin in half. I was very particular about the sound of that skin, and to lose it that way sucked, but taught me a valuable lesson about temperature.

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Fri Mar 29, 2013 6:02 pm
by Jerry Bembe
11am wrote:When touring with Vicky Sue Robinson ( Turn the Beat Around) in the winter months in the 70"s, we did a gig in Chicago , and then had to fly to Miami the next day, I forgot to detune the Quinto, which I always did before flights. Got to Miami and the heat in the cargo hold got so intense it ripped the skin in half. I was very particular about the sound of that skin, and to lose it that way sucked, but taught me a valuable lesson about temperature.


I have seen this happen twice in Chicago during our cold winters as well. Both times a drum that was not de-tuned prior to moving from a warm home through the cold winter in a car trunk to a warm gig had head damage. One bongo had the head pop clean off the drum. The second was a conga that had the head tear. :cry:

Re: Conga's & climates

PostPosted: Fri Aug 22, 2014 2:23 pm
by Greensail
I'm from Florida West Coast and its quite humid here in the summer. With AC however the humidity stays pretty stable. In the winter time with the windows open and delightful weather, the humidity does change dramatically as fronts pass through. Very humid before the front and dry air moving in afterwards. I discovered that I can tune way down just before the front comes through and then as the skins tighten with the dry air, it only takes minimal tightening to tune back up. Way less than prior. This keeps the skin from constantly being stretched more and more.