Vintage TAMA Imperialstar 4-Piece (Metallic White or Platina)

Vintage TAMA Imperialstar from roughly 1979-1981 in (either) Metallic White (or Platina) wrap

this is a second generation Imperialstar from the late 70’s / early 80’s (skinny re-rings, fat One Touch Tone Control mufflers) in a 4-piece configuration (no snare) - sizes are:

-22” x 14” Bass Drum

-12” x 8“ Rack Tom

-13” x 9” Rack Tom

-16” x 16” Floor Tom

I bought this kit off of what I believe to be the original owner of these drums. they were sold as ‘Metallic White’ - but I have extra sizes I found in the while that, when put side by side with this kit, they aren't an exact match and I’m mainly putting this in here to make sure you know that this kit likely likely won’t match yours if you’re adding on!

I think they have a lot more in common with the Platina finish, but I don‘t have a factory Platina to compare them to- others theorize that the Metallic White wrap thickness varied over the years and finding orphan drums that exactly match is somewhat of a pain. I also attached a screengrab of the original finishes in the catalog so you can see for yourself and judge what color this actually is.

I painstakingly took every lug and tension rod and washer off of this kit and deep cleaned it all. got rid of a lot of the rust, but there’s still some spots here and there. as with many kits from this era, there are hairline cracks forming in the wrap in some areas with tension (mufflers, maybe a couple of spots around a lug or two, etc.)

some of the hardware has pitting in it (as to be expected with a 40+ year old kit) but none of it is bad enough that the hardware won’t function. in my restoration process, I put all new heads on (batters have been played for the demo which I’ve linked).

PLEASE NOTE: the original owner drilled 3 holes into the side of the 16” floor tom, originally having a tom mount added (which I believe was meant to hold a cowbell or something) - these holes do not affect the sound and luckily are on the players side facing away from the audience. the ONLY non original parts are the bass drum leg mounts. the originals were trashed by the previous owner, so I replaced them with Swingstar mounts.

if you have any questions, please feel free to message me! make me an offer as well, I’d love to work with you. thanks for reading!