No problem dude! Let us know how you get on.

Zitat von T.C. im Beitrag #3

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Great explanation, James. I'd just add one bit of advice - when you do as James has suggested, I would change only ONE THING at a time and play with that for a while to really understand what that one change accomplished. If you change too many things at once, you may have overshot what you're trying to do and get frustrated.

Welcome to the world of the absolute best pedals out there. :)

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Yes, I should have mentioned that! Thats really important!

Hey Taylor, can you let us know how you had your Axis set up? And are you trying to get the Darwin to feel just like the Axis? It's hard to say exactly what is needed unless we know what kind of thing you're going for. Also it sounds like you've been switching back and fourth between various settings, so Id definitely say its worth sticking with a setting ad really getting to know it first.

The axis X having the fixed position on the direct drive is similar to an Axis A with the VDL pushed all the way forwards (towards the drum). That tends to be a very light feel, which is the opposite of what you've mentioned you're wanting. If you want that feel, I would use the direct drive with the cam opened up fully, or ideally using the radical cam. Keep in mind the darwin has LOTS of option on where the direct drive sits due to it being able to move with the cam (similar to VDL) but also move on the footplate at the bottom, and then the angle of the cam itself changing. My advice would be to find a photo of the X sideways on so that you can clearly see the angle and geometry of the direct drive linkage, and then copy this shape and angle with your Darwin.

For the feel you describe with a heavier feel at the start, I would bring the direct drive closer to the pedal and close up the cam. But this will feel VERY different to your axis and require more force. A huge part of how easy the pedals are to play and how responsive they feel is also in the footboard height. Again, this cant be changed separately of the beater angle on the Axis pedals, so if you want the same you'd need to copy it from a picture, or just experiment with that until you have the feel you'd keen on. You could also try the heel raisers on the Darwins so that the footboard feels more similar to your axis. You can still get the same footboard angle with the stock Darwins, but the lower heel plate can be a bit awkward coming straight from an Axis.

The last pedals I was using before I got my Darwins was A Longboards and instead of trying to get the Darwins to feel like the Axis, I used it as an opportunity to have something better. So I switched to the strap drives which I much prefer, and used a longer beater throw with a lighter spring tension. I like the round cams for a totally linear feel where the stroke feels the same throughout. This works great for heel up ankle technique, but is about as far away from an axis feel as is possible other than the lightness. Dont forget to experiment with beater height and weight as that will have a huge impact on the way the stroke feels. the higher/heavier the beater, the more effort the pedal will take to play with and the heavier it'll feel to get it started. The lower/light the beater, the faster and more responsive it'll feel. All of these settings play off of one another, so when you change one, you may need to compensate slightly with another. I would start with a very general "everything at middle" starting point, and then tweak from there, paying attention to what changes each thing makes.

Hope this helps!

Awesome!

Hey guys!

Sorry for the delay with the video demo for the Phantoms. It's been crazy in the studio lately and the videos take quite a long time to do. Anyway, I think it's done so I'm going to send it to Dennis to make sure there isn't anything wrong with it and then I'll be able to share it with you. For anyone still on the fence, these feel very very close to the Darwins with Fatboy cams and the quality is just the same. Very very smooth, easy to play pedals that are rock solid. The main thing that surprised me was that these were meant to be a stripped down, simple alternative to the Darwins, but the Phantoms actually have plenty of adjustments and share allot of the Darwin's features. So these are a great alternative is you aren't interested in changing cams or the Darwins are a little out of your budget.

Anyway... video soon!

Yea some of the design ideas have been around for a long time. I think really the design of the bass drum pedal hasn't changed all that much since the 30's. There are some new ways to do things like the compression spring instead of the expansion spring, but otherwise its all built on the same foundations and guys like Dennis have just found much more efficient ways to do it. One of the only things I've seen thats really quite different was the PDP boa pedals. I used to play those and actually they felt fantastic but very different and unfortunately the double pedal has some pretty serious design flaws, but back then I only played single pedals on two bass drums. I think DW actually used allot of the concepts from that pedal in their Machine series now, but overall the BOA felt much nicer than the DW.
I do like the vintage Sonor pedals. Those were very smooth and I think Sonor have always been very forward thinking with the hardware. Tama stuff is great and I used to like the older Iron Cobras from the early 2000's and late 90's, but I haven't tried anything properly vintage from them.

Anyway, let's keep this chat all about the Phantom pedals! I actually think these will really appeal to guys who liked the older vintage pedals like the Sonor Horst link and phonic pedals as well as people who like the old Camco pedals because the Fatboy cam used on this has a really smooth, light and linear feel due to the oversized round cam and strap drive. And it'll tick the boxes for the guys wanting the more modern direct drive thing when thats released too! Its a very exiting pedal!

Not sure what your point is here? I cant tell if you're trying to say that Pearl copied ACD (the pedals are NOT similar) or if you're saying that Dennis shouldn't bother because a factory is making pedals just as good (they arent!)?

This pedal is just a mass produced, over priced, simplified demon drive.

The hoop clamp and other things are exactly the same as the demon drive. This pearl pedal took two years of design apparently. Ant they would have had a whole team on it full time! The phantom was done in Dennis' spare time as a side project and still has far more innovation.

Personally I just see this pearl pedal as the perfect reason for people to buy a Phantom!

Crazy that pearl are doing this. They tried to enter the "super league" pedals with the demon drive, but they don't have the quality to back it up. Great feeling pedals that are well designed but cheaply made. Those are my thoughts anyway.

This new pedal isn't Machined aluminium it just "features Machined aluminium parts". Basically the footboard, and the red bits. Otherwise it's still a mass produced pedal. it's a stripped down, lighter feeling demon drive with less adjustment. They are trying to appeal to the top end of the market and do the Axis design and the price is partly to make it seem like a pedal on par with Axis and trick etc. As for the lack of adjustment, it's intentional because supposedly it "just works". And I believe them, it probably does "just work". So does every pedal ever made, but for it to be perfect for me, I want adjustments! It's like buying a signature stick. It may be perfect for that player who only needs one stick because they only play one style, but I have to cover everything from metal to jazz, so I need to be able to swap my sticks and to swap my pedal settings to suit the situation. People will buy this pedal, I'm sure. And if anything, I feel it may really hurt Axis. But this still cant compete with the "big boys" because the quality just isn't there.

Perfect for brand people who only want to play pearl...

Absolutely love the hoop clamp concept on this from a convenience point of view!

Pure pedal porn!

Super excited for this!

Hi Ralph! I see what you're after, it does depend a little because the DW5000 has been through a few versions!

As you say you're using the older style, I'm guessing it's one of the single chain versions. Those should feel similar to the straps because they're a much lighter weight pedal than the more modern 5000's. The main areas of difference here are going to be that the Darwin is a much smoother pedal, so in order to get a similar amount of resistance you'll probably end up having more spring tension than needed which will result in a really fast feel as the pedal will be so much more responsive than the 5000 at that spring tension. Also keep in mind the spring geometry of the Darwin means that you'll get a similarly responsive feel (where the pedal is glued to the underneath of your foot) even at lower tensions than your 5000. I would suggest keeping the spring tension nice and low and increasing the beater distance from the batter head to get the response but with a looser feel.

It's always going to feel a little "faster" unless you make it much heavier which then will feel quite different. On the plus side, you will get used to this fairly soon if you can dial in the rest how you like it.
The other main difference is wether you have long or shortboards on your Darwin. The longboard is always going to feel much faster and lighter because of the angle. Shortboard pedals have a more immediate response but a heavier feel and for a heel down player especially, this is enormously different. So I would say if you have longboards, then definitely investing in some shortboards for your Darwin will get you MUCH closer to what you're after.

After that there are still some tweaks to try - on your Darwin if its stock, the cam won't be quite the same as the DW. If you have the old Camco round cam versions then the Fatboy would be a closer feel, but the Darwin cam is still very round if you don't open it up. I'd say possibly to tilt the cam down a touch just to reduce the eccentric nature of it and then compensate by raising the footboard height. The minimal cam makes the pedal more chain-like, but only in terms of the heaviness and power. So thats probably better for something like an iron cobra feel rather than the classic single chain 5000's. If its the lightness thats throwing you then definitely going with a heavier beater will help. but keep in mind the N+1 isn't a heavier beater, its just more adjustable. But any of the Darwin beaters can get nice and heavy if you add in the beater weight and use a heavy weighted beater disc. Keep in mind that the standard DW beaters are stupidly heavy and that will Mae the whole pedal feel massively different to your Darwin. Also adjusting the height of your beater will help to create a more swinging, top-heavy feel. For some reason everyone seems to adjust their beaters to hit dead centre on the bass drum. Thats crazy to me unless playing a wide open drum, but even then I'm swapping between 20",22" and 24" bass drums in the studio all the time so I cant keep changing the height every other day. Instead I setup the height of the beater for the feel I'm after and it usually works on each drum tonally anyway.

Hopefully this helps! Let us know how you get on and we can trouble shoot a bit more if needed!

James

Hi Ralph, I totally get what you mean. I'm just about to start tracking in the studio but I'll get back to this and hopefully be able to help you out in a couple of hours!

Cheers!

James

Straps are generally the most efficient option (efficient - not necessarily better) since there are no bearing/linkages or any points of friction. Of course it’s still down to personal preference - but generally straps give the versatility of chain but with the lightness of direct drive. If you’re happy with your direct drive I wouldn’t see a need to change to the straps, but they’re a great option to have for experimentation. I switch between the two every now and then for fun, but after being a direct drive player for over a decade, I generally prefer the straps on my Darwin pedals.
Here’s a video I made really talking about the differences and pros and cons of each -
https://youtu.be/dKw-CTfCLcw

Cheers!

Sorry dude I’ve been away with work for a while. You’re totally welcome, I’m glad it’s working well! Happy drumming!

Sounds good dude! Looking nice and relaxed too!

Sorry for the slow reply.

Looking at the photo I would say it's a combination of the spikes being out too far and probably your surface. If the spikes are out this far then the weight of the drum on the hoop clamp will tilt the pedal forward. If you have a softer or moving surface you probably won't notice the spikes are out too far - but then the weight of the drum would do this. It's not going to be because of the velcro depth. I would give it a try on a really solid flat surface with the spikes fully retracted and see if it does the same thing. At least then we can rules it out. Obviously this will move around because you won't have the velcro doing its job, but it should help find out what is causing the tilt.

Thanks Dennis, I'm glad you like the video! If anyone has any questions (there was LOTS cut out of the video the edit) feel free to ask away!

Hey dude! I'm glad you found the video useful! Unfortunately I can't see the pic you attached here, but maybe I could still be of some help?

The original edits of the video were waaaaay longer so even with this video being twice as long as I'd like, there was quite a bit that I wanted to say that I had to cut out!

I just wanted to address your observation about the tilting in my playing example towards the end of the video. If you watch right at the start wen I walk over to the seat, you'll notice that me walking over there makes the floor/carpet squish down and the whole pedal etc actually moves with me. I don't have the tilting or pivoting problem when I play the pedals, that was just the movement in the floor which in my studio is also acting as acoustic control. And even in these playing examples, I couldn't feel the pedals moving up and down under my feet because obviously the foot plate was moving with me and the movement in the floor and carpet really was minimal compared to how it may have looked on camera. Also keep in mind that this part was to show how little the hoop clamp has to do with the pedals moving around on the floor, so this example didn't have the hoop clamp fastened. With the clamp fastened there is far less movement (no more than a more traditional pedal with a "normal" hoop clamp) because it makes the drum and pedal one unit.

In terms of the noises you've encountered, could you describe it? Maybe it'll give as some clues to help figure out what's going wrong there for you. There was no mic on the bass drum for that playing part at the end of my video, so this is a room mic which would pick up any of the noise you mentioned. I'm not sure what that could be. As I said, if you could describe it that might help diagnose the problem.

With the velcro/ruuber pads height difference - you have to keep in mind that if the velcro was the same depth as the pads, they would stop the velcro from being able to go down deep enough to grip the fibres of the rug. Again with my video the pedals were places on the rug and carpet but not pushed in. One of the parts I cut from the video is an explanation of how I place the pedals. I cut it because I didn't think people would want to be told how to put a pedal on the ground... but as silly as it may sound, its still something worth mentioning since we are talking about how to get the most out of this specific pedal system. I lay them where they need to be, then while pressing down lightly I move them backwards and forwards and slightly side to side just to get the velcro to really dig in and grip. Remember, this isn't really typical velcro, its a much stronger, larger and firmer type of hook so once really "worked in" to the carpet, they should be really flat unless (like in my video) the surface you're playing on has any movement or "give".

To answer your questions, the short answer to both is "however you like" really. I know thats not helpful! To me, the way I did makes the most sense, but really it's just down to whatever works, and my idea of something logical may be totally wrong to others!
I may have cut the velcro a little shorter to get it further in the back of the pedal, but if I did it was only a tiny amount. I placed them like this this to make sure that the front strip prevents pedal creep while the back strip is further back to give stability and prevent side to side movement as I tend to use a slight swivel motion for faster parts. But really any even spread with good surface area should get you very similar results.

I'm sorry if this isn't very helpful! I feel like if the pedal is setup correctly it'd most likely be something to do with the floor stability? that would make the pressure of the drum on the hoop make the pedal sink into the floor a little at the front until you're applying force towards the mid and back. I haven't experienced any problems with the pedals pivoting or tipping except when I have had techs tilt the bass drum up too high on the reso side (putting extra pressure on the hoop clamp) and with a student over extending the spikes while "experimenting" with the pedals...