2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft late 80's & Palisades Park

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2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft late 80's & Palisades Park

Postby ABAKUA » Thu Nov 29, 2012 12:50 pm

So excited, had to share!
Brand new, sitting in a warehouse since the early 80's. still has original plastic film on the badges. 11.75" conga & 12.5" tumba. Original woodcraft model from Germany before the production moved to Thailand.
I had been searching for this model for as far back as I can remember! They are Oak. Have put a deposit on them but will be a little while before I take delivery, they are on the other side of the country and not at the most affordable of prices! Lay away/lay buy plan it is til then! Good thing is freight won't cost me a cent, they are around the corner from my interstate office and can get them across on the next stock transfer truck. I think these will be the last of the additions to my drum family for a while (famous last words!)... Unless of course I find more of these to complete the full set! :twisted: :roll: :lol: 8) :oops:
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby pcastag » Thu Nov 29, 2012 12:54 pm

Nice, very nice.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby burke » Thu Nov 29, 2012 1:32 pm

The "True Skin" logo caught my eye. Never heard of or seen before. Was that what Meinl used on all their drums back then?

Zoomed in - its Thai water buffalo are you sure they were still being made in Germany?

D
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby ABAKUA » Thu Nov 29, 2012 8:28 pm

Skins for some reason have been changed, they are not the skins the drums were released with. Prob covered in dust for so many years got ratty. The drum series and badging is consistent with made in Germany. Zoom in on badge brother, you will see made in Germany.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby Mike » Thu Nov 29, 2012 9:03 pm

Very fine find, Marcelo!
The "true skin"-stamped skins should be somewhat more recent, but nevertheless good quality,
way beyond the ordinary skins they put on Meinls these days.
Nice german-made conga set, Meinl have known what they were doing for some time now.
Peace & drum
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby ABAKUA » Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:23 pm

Thanks guys! im absolutley cheering i found these. My main teacher had a full set of these over 20 years ago, I remember being blown away by these drums back then, over the years he sold the conga and tumba and today he only has the Quinto which he will never part with, it sounds amazing. He hates himself for getting rid of them. They have since been lost in time. The drum has been through so much and has so many stories to tell. Giovanni wanted to buy the 3 of them off him when they did a support act gig for Dizzy's United Nations gig in Sydney back in the day, Gio was blown away by them but as they were still somewhat new he could not part with them... It has stood the test of time and is still in great condition. Very well put together drums by original old school Meinl.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby burke » Thu Nov 29, 2012 11:47 pm

"Zoom in on badge brother, you will see made in Germany."

Excellent!

D
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby torpedo tom » Fri Nov 30, 2012 12:32 am

How did you find them?
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby Omelenko1 » Fri Nov 30, 2012 4:11 am

Mongo had 2 sets of 3 of those. He played them in his later years. Nice well made congas.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby congamyk » Fri Nov 30, 2012 4:14 am

Dude those are DIAMONDS! Pure GOLD! What a find.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby ABAKUA » Fri Nov 30, 2012 7:19 am

torpedo tom wrote:How did you find them?


Id been searching for years and last week I was trolling random internet pics looking for the woodcrafts locally, found a pic of a set of blue Floatune series which I followed and on the site i saw a small pic with lots of drums and timbales, congas etc where in the background I saw the woodcrafts and recognized them immediately! The pics were very old, so I emailed the owner of the site and turned out they were pretty sure the drums were still in the warehouse somewhere, forgotten stock over the years. Naturally I was all over it like a bad rash! :lol:

Omelenko1 wrote:Mongo had 2 sets of 3 of those. He played them in his later years. Nice well made congas.


Si brother, Ive seen pics of Mongo working out on some light coloured natural finish oak ones! I think bongosnotbombs recently posted the same pic.
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Good enough for Mongo, good enough for me! hahahaha

congamyk wrote:Dude those are DIAMONDS! Pure GOLD! What a find.


My sentiments exactly!! I cant believe after all these years I've finally found a set. :D
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby p.a.dogs1 » Fri Nov 30, 2012 12:28 pm

Congratulations! Very nice drums. They are made by a traditional barrel maker (tubber?) in Franken (northern part of Bavaria) on the authority of Meinl. In 1998 there was an article in a German drum magazin on the occasion of the resumption of producing the Woodcraft series.

Here is the general description: http://www1.sticks.de/magazine/9801/woodcraft.htm

And here is a description of how the congas were built: http://www1.sticks.de/magazine/9801/meinl.htm

Of course it is written in German – some facts:

The barrel maker´s name is Mueller and they build barrels in Unternesselwang (a little village in Franken/Bavaria) since several generations.

Prototypes of the new Woodcrafts were made in the beginning of 1997.

The material is German oak. The trees have to be around 200 years old. The wood gets cut into pieces of 65 mm thickness and has to (air-) dry 1/cm years (Foto 1).

The staves are sawed with a specific machine, which already considers the miter of the final curve. Then the staves are arranged to a round form and fixed with provisoric metal hoops. After this they get cooked for about 30 minutes in a big tub with water as preparation for the bending process. A machine put over more metal hoops to form the correct bending of the conga.

After this procedure the bodies have to dry two days at 60°C in a special oven. Then the staves are glued together (Foto 8 ).

There are specific turning calibers for the different sizes´ shapes and the bearing edges for the skins.

The bodies get their stains rubbed in with clothes: "Bordeaux Oak", "Cognac Oak", "Dark Oak", "Natural Oak" and "Rustikal Oak".

After this the final metal hoops were brought into their correct positions - they were not belted on but pushed as completed hoops in ring form.

The mounted hardware is from Meinl´s production in Thailand. The so-called True-Skins are normal for this resumed production. So I think, your instruments are made in the end of 90ies or beginning of the new millenium. The Woodcrafts from the 80ies were all in natural oak (maybe also in Rustical, but not in Bordeaux like yours´). And at that time badges were not covered with films - this is typical for all kinds of revival stuff.

One year later Meinl offered Woodcraft bongos as well: http://www1.sticks.de/magazine/9811/meinl.htm

You can also find some special series of congas made by Mueller in Unternesselwang. I own a Selection Series´tumba made of bavarian cherry wood (in the way of Woodcrafts) in the end of the 90ies. Another Selection Model is made of bavarian ash (I am not sure). There was a thread about a cracked Selection conga at congaplace.com: viewtopic.php?f=14&t=7461

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Last edited by p.a.dogs1 on Fri Nov 30, 2012 1:34 pm, edited 6 times in total.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby p.a.dogs1 » Fri Nov 30, 2012 12:48 pm

Here is a link to the today´s website of Fa. Mueller in Unternesselwang: http://www.fassfabrik-mueller.de/cws/in ... uns.7.html

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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby KING CONGA » Fri Nov 30, 2012 3:29 pm

What a find. Congratulations Marcelo. I have always admired the quality and craftmanship of that particular drum, it realy does stand out. I too noticed That Mongo owned and played a set just like them.
Yhea right! C'mon Marcelo give us a break, "I think these will be the last of the additions to my drum family for a while", once a conga junkie always a conga junkie!!!! LOL

P.S.
Youre getting closer to something I would consider as a trade :P

Cheers.
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Re: 2 gems found! Meinl Woodcraft circa late 70's/early 80's

Postby Psych1 » Fri Nov 30, 2012 5:10 pm

Very nice tumbas!! I had one of the Woodcraft-Collection series bongos for many years - finally passed it on to a student. The quality of the build and the hardware was outstanding. I even kept the "True-skin" heads on - they were far better than LPs "Hand-picks" . Good find.
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