How A 5A Is Made

“How A 5A Is Made” is a compilation of our Vic Firth #HowItsMade Series on Instagram which takes you through each step of our drumstick making process.

The Process:
Part 1: 0:17 – The process begins with “green boards” (undried wood cut from a live tree) being cut on site in our sawmill.

Part 2: 0:56 - The wood is dried to exact specifications in our own specially modified kilns.

Part 3: 1:08 – Our carefully dried wood is fed through a cutting head and reduced from a square shape to a dowel.

Part 4: 2:04 – All of our dowels are put on a conveyor belt and inspected for weight and straightness. Any dowel that does not meet the Vic Firth standard is either sanded down for a second attempt or rejected. Then the dowels are inspected by hand for any imperfections: grain, straightness, blemishes.
The inspection results in 1 of 4 outcomes:
1.) A dowel that meets all criteria is categorized as a Vic Firth stick.
2.) A dowel that meets all the physical quality criteria but as cosmetic issues becomes a colored or dipped Vic Firth stick.
3.) A dowel that doesn’t meet the Vic standard but is still considered drumstick quality wood becomes our economy quality drumstick line: NOVA sticks.
4.) A dowel that doesn’t match one these 3 categories is rejected and goes to the boiler.

Part 5: 3:02 – All of our dowels are put through grinding machines to shape our various models of sticks. Grinding with stone molds puts less stress on the wood and is a more consistent process compared to lathing sticks. The first grinder shapes the stick to the perfect size specs and the second grinder shapes the tip and neck of the stick.

Part 6: 4:04 – For our 5A Nylon Tip models, the tips are formed at the grinders so that we can easily mold the Nylon Tip around the stick. The sticks are then put in an injection molding machine where the molten nylon forms to the tip. The tip now becomes part of the stick and can hold up during play. There is no glue involved in our process and therefore the tips won’t come off with impact. Also the uniformity between a 5A Wood Tip and a 5A Nylon Tip are identical to allow for the same balance and feel no matter the tip.

Part 7: 4:45 – All 5A models are printed with the official red and black Vic Firth logo along with the stick model type and size. The logo being printed is etched in a steel plate, ink is poured over the plate and scraped away, leaving only the ink in the etching. Then a silicone rubber pad grabs the logo etching off the steel plate and stamps it onto the stick. There are two separate stamps: one for the red ink portion and the other for the black ink.

Part 8: 5:37- All of our sticks are tested for straightness, sorted by weight and pitch matched to make the perfect pair. If the stick passes our straightness requirements then they are weighted and sorted by increments of 2 grams from light to heavy. After weight sorting, our sticks then go through a pitch matching process in order to tone match each pair. The stick is struck three times and recorded in a program that analyzed the fundamental frequency of each stick. The sticks are then paired by similar frequencies.

Part 9: 6:33 - Sticks of equal weight and pitch are then paired together on a conveyor belt and put into a machine which puts the sticks into sleeves and labels the sleeves with the model and bar-code.

Part 10: 7:25 – Pairs of varying weights from light to heavy are bricked in packs of 12 pairs. The bricks are then shrink wrapped, labeled with a bar-code and placed in a box for shipping.

Part 11: 8:14 – The final step of “How A 5A is Made” is packing and shipping. Our bricks of sticks are boxed up, packed on pallets and shipped out to our warehouse to be distributed all over the world and into your hands!

#HowA5AIsMade #vf5A #MyPerfectPair #HowItsMade

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For more info on our Vic Firth How It’s Made process, visit:
➤Website: http://www.vicfirth.com
➤Instagram:   / vicfirth  
➤Facebook:   / vicfirth.company