I then did some research on the internet and found sites and videos like yours and http://www.farmerfootdrums.com This is getting me excited to see how much mileage I can get out of just my feet. My fantasy is to play a convincing, albeit incomplete, rock kit with my feet while singing and strumming on a guitar. I’d like to get your opinion on some logistical considerations.

I figure I could have about six pedals for each foot, to control the following pieces: bass drum, snare, rack tom, floor tom, hi hat, ride, and crash. Some of the pedals would be double pedals so that I can get rolls and different coordinations from the same piece. The set up might look like this, from left to right, on two ‘levels’ of pedals:

Crash Rack Floor Rack Floor Hi-Hat
Hi-Hat Snare Ride Snare Bass Crash

I also figure it’d be cool to keep some of the pedals close together so that you can hit two of them at the same time (like hi-hat/snare, bass/crash, if you turn your foot diagonal snare crash)

I also think it’d be cool to possibly have some sort of clutch on the hi-hat so you could switch from tight to loose sounds.

Not being a drummer primarily, I wonder if you think this would actually work out logistically, if it would be convincing, and if I’m missing anything necessary.

Stebs

1) You’re right. I thought that the “Jungle Gig” conversion kit came with the tom mount, but now that I see it in the catalog, I remember that the ISS mount was separate (I just happened to buy them at the same time!). I think the BT-3 is integrated into the ISS1216 though, so it shouldn’t be an additional purchase.

2) The beater is called the “Reyes Mounted Cowbell Beater”, seen here: http://www.regaltip.com/phpshop2/?page=shop/flypage&product_id=75&category_id=14e8b5f200b2d475350eb34e36a0d629&PHPSESSID=c3caf5fa848c47ca44779de777b905de. It looks like they’ve changed teh design several times since I got mine, but it should still work. I’ve thought about trying one of the “Iron Cobra” style wood beaters as well, as they seem to have a smaller impact point, but I haven’t gotten to it yet!

3) I found that using a small drum with a double pedal, I don’t need any legs attached to the drum. One of the things I DIDN’T want to do was have to drill into a drum to attach hardware, so that led me to the 5×13 snare. With a larger drum though, you may have to either add some brackets for legs, or brace it from the bottom somehow.

Hope that helps, and please keep me posted on your own experiments and progress – we may just start a trend here!

I’ve come across your blog because I too am a musician who has been trying to figure out how to best set up a snare drum for foot pedal operation. I’m actually a guitarist so finding this blog post is great. I had a few of my own ideas but who knows if they would have actually worked?!!

I’ve got a 6 x 14 snare (I think it should still be pretty stable)

I do have a few questions for you though (since I somewhat uninformed regarding drum hardware etc)

1) It’s my understanding that in addition to the JS16 converter kit I will also need
a) Pearl BT-3 tom mount bracket
and b) Pearl IS1216SL ISS Mount 12″ to 16″

for more on this, see the comment and recommended other purchases at this link: http://www.amazon.com/Pearl-JG16-Jungle-floor-converter/dp/B0002F4TBO/ref=pd_sim_MI_2

Is this what you would recommend to best connect the snare to the JG16? I consider you the world wide web expert on this topic so thought i would run it by you before I made a purchase.

2) I can’t seem to find any of those nifty old style ‘regal tip cowbell beaters’ do they go by another name?

and 3) how did you attach the JG16 support legs to the snare. It looks like you have the legs attached to the snare in the video but I can’t see them in the still pictures.

I appreciate any light you can shed on these questions Andrew.

Thanks kindly.
Richard