The Surprise is Finally Revealed!

Finally the wait is over! Aizat is in his final semester and I thought I want to order something from the rising sun country.. I am actually thinking of ordering t-shirts or smthng but one day, I surfed to Ishibashi webshop and found this crash which I wanted for so long. Its Zildjian 18" A Medium Thin Crash which is the best candidate to replace my old Headliner brass cymbal. The price is also quite cheap considering its almost impossible to get the same exact crash here in Malaysia with that price used or of course new. So after thinking for like few minutes, I then tell Aizat I want this and he said ok. He can use his money first I'll pay later.

About a day later, there is a Pearl maple snare coming up on the site. I couldnt resist it because I always wanted to play and own a maple snare for a very long time. Trust me, this is the toughest decision I've ever made because the question is, can I save up to pay Aizat after the stuffs arrived here? The answer is yes and I have to sacrifice my Sabian Pro cymbals in order to get the money. Hheheheheheh....

Little review:

1) Zildjian 18" Avedis Medium Thin Crash -I only played it once and I would say its a great companion along my K Custom Dark Crash. It is more open and bright compared to K but I think I like my K crash more :P

2) Pearl Z-Type Maple Snare in Silver Sparkle #160
-6.5"x14" dimension
-8ply 100% maple, 10mm thick!!!!
-Pearl "Mastercast" hoops
-Remo Powerstroke 3 on batter and Ambassador on reso

First impression, its beautiful!!!!!!!!! I feel like want to cry when I first open the box because of this beauty.. Its also in very very mint condition.. Looks like new! The lugs, the diecast all are very shiny and is practically new. The head have some stick mark but its very minor.. I had a chance to play this snare in jam session with my band. It have alot of crack and unlike my Bronze snare, it doesnt have unwanted ringing thanks to PS3 head and thick shell. For my bronze snare, I must have this sweet spot to achieve the sweet rimshot sound but for this snare, I can play it normally without rimshot but I still get the volume that I want. Overall, the snare have acceptable sensitivity, deep and warm sound with alot of crack!
Enough of my talking, let the pictures take over..

No its not Canopus snare!!

Dont worry KCDC, you're still my favorite!

The snare pics:
I get free leather snare baghotness!!!

#160 Silver Sparkle close up

Japan Domestic Market only!!!peep hole.. pls count the ply Going to be my new workhorse!

Wrap cleaning

From previous post, you guys may realize the residue from the removed lugs and brackets. I've asked around how to remove the residue and the answer is of course, a plastic cleaner. I've been searching around Carrefour, Tesco and also Giant but failed to found a cleaner which is specific for plastic. Then, I have been told by my colleague that ACE Hardware has everything in their store.. including the one that you cant found in a normal hardware shop.
So, few weeks before I had a small shopping at ACE Hardware and bought myself

1) AUTOSOL Plastic Cleaner (same AUTOSOL but this one for plastic! cool!)

2) MAAS multi purpose metal cleaner (i've read good things about this product and i couldnt believe it can be found in Msia!)

3) Selleys Glue (sad to say, my Pearl Elliminator rubber floor cover flipped)

This morning I have some spare time and tried the AUTOSOL Plastic Cleaner to remove the residue at the toms. As usual, it works like wonders. It also made the wrap shinier.

Now here's the hard part. The eyelets if you can see is full of rust and the eyelets cant be removed with bare hands. This thing will damage if removed and searching for its replacement is almost impossible here. So what I do to clean the rust from the eyelets is to clean what is visible from outside. Dont care the inside of the eyelets.. after all, no one will ever care! (Including me!)

Yup, MAAS works fine just like AUTOSOL.

Everything is clean and shiny!