This is a very early Ludwig vistalite floor tom in the hard to find green color. There is only one small little spider crack coming off of one lug hole (see pics) that is not visible with the lugs on the drum, and can’t be felt with a fingernail…otherwise there there are only some mild scratches here and there, and a couple small white paint drips or some similar little specks. Other than that it looks outstanding.

The seam is original (albeit an hair sloppy as a lot of these early drums are) but it hasn’t been repaired and isn’t in need of repair. The shell itself is clearly an early, special order with two factory mufflers. The reason I know it’s early is because like many early vistalite drums, when I got the drum from the original owner, the bearing edges were a bit all over the place, the seam was glued slightly off on the reso side and there was a slight flat spot in the shell near the seam that clearly caused the edges to be routed horribly at the factory. All this caused heads to fit tight (mostly the reso side) and it made tuning virtually impossible—so I went ahead and had a professional (village drum shop here in Rhode Island) level the edge and recut a factory edge. The heads still fit a little tight but now the edge is perfect on both sides of the drum and it can easily be tuned. A major save vs keeping it “original” and having it sound like garbage.

It is otherwise an all original drum from the original owner. All of the hardware is original down to the tension rod washers and all fasteners, legs, etc. I wrapped the springs in the lugs with felt and I ultrasonic cleaned all the hardware so it shines. The top hoop is extremely nice with just a couple small areas of pitting. The bottom hoop has slightly more corrosion of the chrome in the flange. I cleaned it up with tin foil the best I can (no abrasives) and it looks great from a foot away, but up close you can see a bit of wear—same with the legs (see pics).

Leg mount and legs are original. One rubber booty is a replacement. As I said the legs show a bit of wear and corrosion, but not horrible. There’s a bit of rustiness here and there in the knurling on the legs if you look close but again not horrible at all.

Overall this is quite a collectible drum, all original outside of the recut edges which….in my view all vintage vistalites should get. The typical early vistalite QC issues have been minimized by this treatment and it’s ready to be added to your kit.

This drum is for sale as part of a complete set of 70s vistalite so if that set sells this listing will be ended. Thanks for looking and please ask any questions you may have!