Gretsch GS-VBDCH103 Vintage Bass Drum Cymbal Holder with Tilter

replaced the origial I lost purfictly looks great A+++

Had to add a nylon sleeve for proper it into a bracket. The knurled end is smaller in diameter than the other end of the bracket. This was too loose for a proper fit. Fortunately my fix worked.

I have retrofitted most of my eight kits with this type of arm, but among them are competing arms from DW and Gibraltar. This one is nearly identical to the Gibraltar SC-GBDCA Bass Drum Mounted Cymbal Arm except this one does not come with the mounting hardware. You can purchase that separately as Gibraltar SC-STL4 L-Rod Tom Mount Chrome if you don't mind deviating from the look and feel of most Gretsch drum kits. For the newer Catalina Club Jazz round badge kits the SC-STL4 actually looks nice on the shell.You have an eight inch spread between 18 and 26 inches to raise or lower this arm. That gives you a lot of leeway in shell placement and at the two o'clock mark on a bass drum shell a 20 inch ride cymbal will easily clear most rack toms. To be honest, while this will hold a 22 inch ride cymbal, I would prefer a 12.7mm L-arm (Gretsch makes one not listed here at the time of this review that is model number GS-VBDCH127).Oddly this is a 10.3mm arm, which is slightly under the standard 10.5mm. The Gibraltar mount I mentioned above will accommodate it and firmly hold it in place since it can go all the way from 9.5 to 12.7mm. The tilter gives a lot of angle choices and firmly tightens into whichever setting you choose. And although the upper portion of the L-arm is not knurled, it stays put even with cymbals in the 2500-2700 gram range.For me this is a bargain because even with the Gibraltar mount it's priced in the same range as a decent boom stand, and this is one less stand to lug around. I am not wild about the weird 10.3mm diameter, but have to admit that this does the job.