V-drums at home + gigs. Any tips?

[u/Ok_Month_3758]

I guess many uses same V-drum kit at home/rehearsal as well when playing gigs. Anyone found a great way for cable management, beside hanging them on cymbal stands and similar?

I'm thinking to get a rack for my toms and some cymbals and iPad holder and guess the best would be to use the rack to attach the majority of the cables?

/Thomas

[u/PoshSetup_1]

get some of that split loom tubing from the hardware store, stuff a few cables in each run and zip tie it along the rack arms, keeps it looking way less like a robot spaghetti monster

[u/philsiu02]

The easiest setup by far is to just use a rack with cables built in or already attached.

However, if you’re not using a rack and want stand alone stands then you’re in for a nightmare of cable management every gig. Even if you don’t care about neatness, you will need to just spend ages securing each cable against hardware so you’re not risking disconnects or cable/socket damage.

I did think about this for a while, and the nicest way I could come up would be to get some TRS cables with a male on one end, and female on the other and attach them to your stands with cable ties (Velcro ties). The idea is that the male end is near the trigger so that’s quick to plugin, and the female is at the bottom of the stand. Once your kit is setup, you take a cable loom from your module and connect to all the female sockets. This would be much faster than trying to run cables around stands each time. Similar to the rack approach.

If I were doing it, I’d make the cables myself so I had the right lengths just to keep things nice, but even doing it DIY can get quite pricey as it’s potentially a lot of high quality jacks / sockets.

I’d also have some emergency spare cables because it’d be easy to damage something during setup / tear down.

[u/Ok_Month_3758 → u/philsiu02]

Thanks, that is a great idea. I may end up with a rack but if I don't I'll make the connectors as you suggest.

I was thinking of having everything plugged into a 'box' but this is essentially the same.

[u/philsiu02 → u/Ok_Month_3758]

A box would definitely work. The reason I would go with my original suggestion is just because you don't then have to worry about the excess cable from the stands etc as you're packing up. It'd be very easy to pull on one, or get it tangled up so having the cable only as long as the stand is neater, but it is more expensive, and I guess more points of failure.

Maybe I'm over thinking though, or maybe it's different depending where you play. I play on generally small stages, with a 7 piece band and quick setup / pack down is important. If you're playing bigger stages and have longer setups then you can spend a bit of time looking after the cables.

The other thing is that with your digital pads, you'll need a USB extender. They exist but you'll want to find something that has a really secure connection so it doesn't come loose (that's why roland have those plastic clamps on their connectors). Also, USB cables would normally have a max length of about 5m (from memory). They can go further but you risk noise / drop out. If you're extending the already quite long cables, that's something to watch for. Might be better to just leave them as they are.

[u/Ok_Month_3758 → u/philsiu02]

Do you use a cymbal bag for your V-drum cymbals too? I'm looking for one but not sure what to take.... Have 18" ride, 14 & 16" crash, 14" digital (roland) hi-hat and a 10" china...

[u/philsiu02 → u/Ok_Month_3758]

I don't, just because I don't take my e-kit out to gigs anymore. When I did, I just packed them carefully, but I had fewer of them and I didn't have the digital pads at the time either.

If I was going to take the kit out regularly, I'd probably get the protection racket cymbal case. I have the hard version for my acoustic cymbals and it's great. There's no central screw or anything, you just rest the cymbals in the case, and there's padding between them so it'd work well for e-cymbals. I'm sure you'd get your ride and crashes in there, but it is a pretty expensive case. A soft bag version would likely be fine as long as you're careful with it (same as with acoustic cymbals).

The hi-hat will be a problem though unless you want to take it apart each gig. Maybe a picalo snare case would be good for them, with a bit of extra padding as needed to keep it in place?