A lot of people in the edrumming world tend to consider a mesh pad better than most other types of triggers. For this reason I came up with a method to change out the Alesis DM10 Pro Kit’s Pad to a mesh type conversion (Medeli DD-602 trigger Pad). This conversion is not based on a Roland cone method but a more tried and true reflection plate method. The best part is, they only things you will need to buy for this conversion is a mesh drum head (I recomend the Billy Blast mesh without the center patch) and a three sheets of 12″ x 18″ (3mm thick) EVA craft foam (comes in many color, I used black). The kind I used is called Funky Foam which I got at Hobby Lobby (most craft/hobby store should have). The sheets were $1.00 each. The Billy Blast mesh heads (three 8″ & two 10″) were $10.00 each.
Before we get to the video, let me point out that the 10″ trigger pad (if you are upgrading the DM10 Pro Kit) is a touch different than the 8″ trigger pad. You will find a hole in the thick black foam of your pad. The hole is not, I repeat is not something to worry about. You will find that the trigger works just fine with the hole in the very center. So, don’t fill that hole.
Input Jack wiring Diagram
56 users commented in " Alesis DM10 Pad Upgrade Video! "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackGood Video. Very easily explained.
Roland, for example, has a free air space between the head and the piezo, yes? Aside from that free air space, there’s no difference between this setup and Roland’s?
Question, does the last foam piece (agains the mesh) dampen the delivery to the piezo? And thereby you lose some of the finer notes or ghost notes?
Thanks a lot bro! You are my hero!
No, I’m am not losing any of my finer notes or ghost notes. That’s using a DM10. I wouldn’t put is conversion up if I knew it would not be at least as good as a Roland set-up.
Since there’s still foam making contact with the mesh head, how does re-arranging the internals make the pad feel different? I was picturing no foam touching the head…….Thanks for your response, and for the very well done video.
The original set-up in the pad has only an 1/8″ of foam on top of a steel plate. I feels hard when you hit it. You can feel it bottom out. By doing the upgrade to mesh, you get good rebound and no bottom out feel. The foam is now 1″ thick instead of 1/8″. Big difference.
Congrats for your work, I am sure that is a big upgrade, specially the dual zone thing. About the mesh head, I expected anxiously for your post of the conversion, but i thought you would be making like the roland and pintech pads, no foam inside and lots of rebound feel, and of course more silent. Saying that, is it possible to do the dual zone conversion with the mesh without foam (just a foam cone)? Once again congratulations on your website it´s a weekly stop by for me!! Thanks!! Pedro from Portugal
Your making an assumption that the rebound isn’t that great with my conversion. Bad assumption. There is plenty of rebound. Much more than the stock pad.The pad will not be significantly anymore silent if you use a Roland style set-up. No hot spotting with my design. You will have hot spotting with a Roland set-up. If you really want a Roland set-up, it shouldn’t be that hard to do. Thanks for your comments.
Hey Phil, I tried the mouse pad upgrade on my snare pad(which has a roland mesh head on it) and it’s a noticeable improvement in rebound, feel and
pad volume. How much of an upgrade in feel is the conversion in this new video over this mouse pad trick? You must get sick of people saying “Thank You”, but Thank You!
Well, if you are happy with the mouse pad upgrade, you might want to stick with it. I do think that you will get a much better feel over your current set-up, doing the upgrade in the video. The upgrade in the video will make the trigger pad feel more like a typical mesh head pad (think Roland). I hope that helps.
Nope, I don’t get sick of people saying “Thank You” at all. It’s nice to know that I can help.
Hey Phil, what is your opinion on using Pearl Muffle Heads for this conversion, or would the Billy Blast’s be a better choice? I’m new to the edrumming world so any advise would be appreciated. Thanks alot for your time.
You can use the Pearl Muffle heads if you want. A word of caution, they don’t last very long. Most people want to use them just because they are the cheapest, but they don’t last very long (maybe a month tops). Billy Blast is really the best way to go. $10 is not that much more than $5..Before Billy Blast had their heads your choice would have been between the Pearl Muffle Heads or Roland/Hart heads at $35 a pop. I think $10 is not that bad when you look at it that way.
I was wondering if there was a way to turn the dual zone drums single with a stereo to mono adapter and then use a mono to stereo Y adapter to add extra cymbals and things to the kit. I really appreciate the video and the website. Any info on this would be appreciated.
Do you mean splitting a dual zone input into two single zones inputs? If that is what you are asking, the answer is yes. You just need a stereo to “L”"R” mono cable. Like this one at Guitar Center.
To anyone considering doing this upgrade…….DO IT!!! I just did my first pad using Phil’s video as a guide, and the difference is amazing! I didn’t do the dual zone, just the mesh head conversion…..I bought everything he mentioned, plus a $10 soldering iron and a $10 “third hand” work stand. It was very easy, even though I’d never used a soldering iron before. It feels at least as good as a Roland pad. A couple of minor adjustments on the module and the difference is incredible. I had previously done his mouse pad conversion on my snare pad….while that was an upgrade over the stock drum pad, the difference of this mesh conversion over that is HUGE. Thanks Phil!!!
You can also do this with fiberglass window screen instead of an expensive mesh head.
Yes you could, but a Billy Blast mesh head is only $10.00. I have tried the fiberglass window screen before and unless you are a very lite handed drummer I would never recommend that method. Those type of heads always break on me within one to two weeks of heavy use. If you really want to use the fiberglass window screen you might want to use two layers of it to make it stronger.
Agreed. I do use 2 layers, in fact. They still wear out, but it is trivial in cost to replace. A roll is cheaper than one Billy Blast head and will cover all your pads several times.
One thing: does the piezo go above the metal plate or below?
Also, how do I stop crosstalk between the head and rim?
Should be below
With the DM10 you would just tweak the crosstalk settings in the module. I hope that helps.
I’m using a DM5. While it does have crosstalk control, is there anything I can do to physically deal with it? I lose a LOT of sensitivity on the head if I turn up the crosstalk setting.
Phil, is it necessary to cut the circle out of the white foam? I just performed this conversion on my dm10’s snare, I did not solder/unsolder just cut a slit in the foam, reassembled the foam and did not cut the white foam, i dont see a difference in triggering at all. Im using a set of mesh heads I bought from 682drums.com. the snare feels awesome now! Thanks for making the video.
If it works, go with it. I cut it out so I would not have foam pushing back on the piezo element. I thought it might cause hot spotting but if it works with cutting out the circle, I say great. Now the conversion is even simpler. Thanks for the update.
I converted all the pads. They feel so awesome, just like a roland vdrum almost and the acoustic noise level is reduced dramatically! Im very grateful cuz they really were so loud especially the kick drum. Gotta make you wonder why medeli didnt design it with the piezo plate lower in the drum in the first place.
I plan on doing this upgrade next week on the DM10Pro Kit.
Can anyone suggest a cymbal or cymbal pack to compliment the DM10Pro with the same features as the Surges Cymbals. The cymbals are loud and with the mesh head will only sound louder. Thanks!
I would look into the DMPad cymbal triggers. Similar to the Surge but made of heavy plastic and rubber so they are more quiet. Here’s a link to DMdrummer.com that shows the different Alesis Drums Components
I just completed the conversion. I did cut out the white foam too. Maybe I didn’t need to. Either way, it works, and I didn’t have to change any sensitivity or crosstalk settings. Crosstalk actually improved.
Pictures here: http://www.dmdrummer.com/index.php?topic=131.30
I used the Slit method, as all my heads were already dual zone (except the kick). I also spray adhesived the slit closed. I also cut out a t-shirt to use between the dark gray foam and mesh head. It looks good, as the head it white, instead of checkered white/black.
Phil is the man! The heads sound fantastic! Although, in comparison, now the surge cymbals are quite loud.
I just completed my conversion using the exact foam Phil listed as well as the Billy Blast heads. I had ordered the heads a couple weeks ago (also didn’t realize he is local to me).
I was totally prepared to do the soldering until I checked back here and saw that some were just cutting a slit in the foam. Well thats what I did and it saved a boat load of time. I did cut out the circle in the white foam however.
I must say I am very very pleased with the result. I was slightly disappointed with the acoustic noise of the stock drums. This conversion is not only quiets the drum but it feels so much better!
Back to my cymbals, in headphones the Surge cymbals feel so good but playing without through the Alesis drum monitor it is annoying. My friend is buying the studio kit so I may play with the DMpad cymbals since he offered to trade. I would get an extra cymbal and he gets the Surge.
Thanks Phil. Very stoked you took the time to show us.
Hi Phil,thanks for the guide,I am about to do this to my ordered pads from Medeli. Just wanna ask if these pads work on the Roland TD6 module or not? Also by taking my PDX8 mesh drum apart I can see that the mesh head is actually only touching a little piece of foam which is touching the piezo, would this be a good idea to use the same technique as this or just do it the original way? I do not see too much of a hot spot problem on the PDX8 and I’m not sure about that air concept between the sensor and the mesh head though. So what do you say to that?
Hi, I have done this conversion on both my DM5 and DM10 pro pads and its great. Thanks for that.
One thing I did notice with the DM5 pads, was that resistors are fitted in the socket. presumably to limit the voltage the piezo will send to the module. When I added a 2nd piezo for the rim, I didn’t bother adding resistors. The DM10 pads to not have these resistors. I presume the DM10 module which I am using all the pads with, has a better dynamic range on the trigger inputs!!
I do find, with these resistors, the trigger sensitivity needs to be a little higher to get them to be a good match compared to the pads without them, so I am tempted to go back and remove them all.
Have you any comments/views on this?
My DM10 pads had the resistors on them. I removed all the resistors and haven’t had one problem. I hope that helps. Thanks for your comments.
Hi Phil,
I’m thinking about getting the new DM10 Studio set. Do you know- Does the DM10 pads have a good velocity response? I mean, can you get the full 1-127 range on one of these pads? Maybe that’s a piezo question more than anything. I want to use this set with Superior Drummer on my PC, and Superior has, from what I understand, different samples for every velocity, and I just want to make sure I’m taking full advantage of the software.
Thanks,
Jason
Yes, and there are adjustments on the DM10 to help set that up your velocity response. I hope that helps.
I’m just curious, around how much does this whole conversion to mesh cost for the pads and the tools required?
Sorry about the money question. I sometimes treat forums like google and forget to read first. Anyway, here is an important issue that I belive others may run into. I’ve also posted it on http://www.dmdrummer.com:
I watched Hellfire’s video and from what I understand there are five components:
A.)Plate Foam
B.)Plate
C.)White Foam
D.)Rebound Foam
E.)Purcahsed Craft Foam
If I remember Hellfire’s video correctly they are arranged top to bottom: A, B, C, and D. Then Hellfire rearranges them so that they are D, A, B, C, and E (with a hole cut in ‘C’ and the the edge of ‘A’ cut shorter).
Now after reading some forum postings, including those from Hellfire’s website, I am trying to wrap my head around the different variations.
Are you guys basically saying that ‘D’ already has a hole in it on the DM10 kit? If so, are you still arranging it in the D, A, B, C, and E configuration with cuts made to ‘C’ and ‘A’.
Phillip, if I understand you correctly, it sounds like the point of the ‘C’ hole cut is because of hot spotting, but then @Mta1981 didn’t make the hole cut in ‘C’ and it sounds like he had no problem with hot spotting. However, since it sounds like the DM10 comes with a hole cut into ‘D’, underneath the plate, then it is more than likely necessary. If ‘D’ already has a hole do you still cut a hole into ‘C’ in this case with the D, A, B, C, and E arrangement? I know almost next to nothing about hot spotting.
I’m doing this upgrade to try to reduce the acoustic level of my kit, but I’d rather not have the crazy rebound that comes with mesh heads. Ideally, I’d like it to play like an acoustic kit so that I don’t get used to superhuman rebound if I ever transfer over to full acoustic kit down the road.
Anyway, is it necessary to cut the edge of A? I’m willing to do soldering but I’d rather not cut any of the foam if its an option. I was thinking about this top to bottom arrangement: E, C, A, B, and D. However, I wonder whether that small pre-made hole in ‘C’ (made by the manufacturer) would cause any problems since its right underneath the mesh. I don’t know if having ‘E’ on top of ‘C’ would be enough to fix the problem.
Sorry for the overtly-detailed posting. Thanks to anyone who takes the time to read this.
Hi Hellfireteam,
i got a question to this upgrade. in my dm 10 studio kit pads there are holes in every ‘rebound foam’, just like the ones you suggest to cut in the white foam, so that the piezo does’nt touch it. if i put rebound foam on top, just underneath the mesh head will there be a problem? because just right there in the center there would be no foam support…
is it necessary or not to cut the hole in the white foam?
thanks very much in advance and you’re the man =)!
I would try the easiest first. You can always go back and change it later. I know a few over at DMdrummer.com did not cut a hole in the white foam if they had the hole in the black foam. They still put the black foam on top and even with the hole they state that it works great. No problems. If you get a chance you might want to check out DMdrummer.com.
i just did the conversion and i’m so happy with it! thank you so much phil/hellfire for doing this video and sharing your knowledge with us. the rebound improved so much and the noise level decreased dramatically. and instead of using black craft foam i used orange one and so i also got a optical upgrade =)
Hi there I did this conversion to a dm10 kit and all the pads had a hole in the black foam. I have to adjust the sensitivity all the way to 99 to get a proper level (it distorts a little). Has anyone else found this problem? I was wondering if using a more dense foam would work better. Still is a awesome conversion.
Hi, I’m having trouble loading the vid. tried to watch about 2 weeks and it wouldn’t load then either. Any solution? Thanks
It may take a little time for it to load. It all depends on your connection speed, and how many people are on at the same time. I just checked it and it took it about 20-30 seconds before it started to play. I hope that helps.
Hi guyes, Im going to order the DM 10 Studio kit. And im really new to mesh head coversions and i know i will brake something if i push my luck.
So im wondering if anyone can explain on a easy level how i do the mesh head conversion without soldering/unsolidering the wires.Or if there are some video out there that shows how to do just that.Im grateful for any kind of info or tips / the one and only bob.
If you go over to DMdrummer.com you will find a few people who have done just that under the DIY section. I hope that helps.
Hello there, I am still waiting on the mesh heads I have ordered to complete the upgrade on my USB pro kit; but in the mean time I replaced the first layer of foam that sits on top of the steel plate and piezo with mouse mats. As you mentioned Phil the original foam didn’t last long at all, and mine were destroyed. They couldn’t have lasted more than a month… Very disappointed with the quality of the manufacture considering the larger price tag for the kit!
Anyways, just replacing the original pads with mats (not cutting any wires, etc) made a massive difference to the rebound and feel. I would even say they are now better than new; amazing tip thanks Phil!
Just a one question though, when I do replace the heads with mesh heads I saw you cut out a resister… What was the purpose in doing this; does that make the piezo more or less sensitive?
Only I feel the messages from the Trigger io are already sensitive even with the most fitting velosity curve setting and no gain so was thinking maybe leave it in and try it first?
Thanks again for the guide on the upgrade, I can’t wait to get the mesh heads on!
Ok thx for the tips !
Removing the resister is to make the trigger a tad more sensitive. Nothing wrong with leaving the resisters in and seeing how it works first. You can always take them out later if you feel you need a little more gain in the piezo signal. Thank for your comments.
I did the dual zone an mesh upgrade and it works nice!! II do have a Medeli dd-602 and for the moment the Jacks are still mono, butt i’m going to change them this weekend. Now i was wondering if the medeli dd-602 module supports dual zone? does anyone know?
Grts
Peter.
Your best bet is to check the manual for the DD-602 module. If it doesn’t say, chances are they are all mono inputs. Here’s a link to a PDF version of the manual:
http://www.medeli.com.hk/downloads/DD602-DD1000-manual-V002.pdf
I hope that helps.
I did already checkt the manual but they don’t say wether it’s mono of stereo. I have my stereo cables now and i’m going to test it this evening with superior drummer…
If the module doesn’t support it i can always buy another one second handed.
I’ll keep you posted.
Iv been strictly an acoustic player my whole life,(since age8)and have recently found myself stairing down the barrel of a married life with kids and a townhouse. Since we moved in my drums have been packed into a closet, 7 years now! I dying over here! I cant take it anymore! Needless to say, I’ve been doing much research on edrums before i buy and, unless im missing something, it sounds like the Alesis DM10 is the way to go! Even more so after watching that convertion to mesh on the drum pads. Why would anyone spend the money on a TD9 when they could save a G and get equal performance (after the head convertion of course), and a module that is basically taking the market by storm! Im stoked! Cant wait til’ next week when I can place my order for the DM10 Pro Kit. Thanks to Phil and HellFire for really setting the bar high on in-depth, and specific information to help make my decision an informed and exciting one. Cant wait to start beating the skins again. You guys kick ass!
Just one question. From what i read and hear, sounds like the Surge cymbals have more acoustic noise than the all rubber types. Noise level is a concern of mine living in a townhouse. However, i have concrete walls separating the house on both sides. Taking that into consideration, how concerned should I be with the level of acoustic noise from the Surge cymbals?
Also, since im here. After doing the mesh head conversion on the DM10, are there any areas of the kit that fall short in a comparison to the Roland TD9? Basically, Im trying to find out what the TD9 can do that the DM10 cannot. I think the TD9 module might have a couple extras that the DM10 doesn’t but, depending on what they are it might not matter. Thanks.
Just wanted to confirm that all the heads on the new DM10 Pro Kit are dual zone? Pretty sure thats the case. So I wount NOT have to go through the soldering and adding of Peizo when I do the mesh head upgrade right? I could skip the wiring and just re-arrange the foam pads, do the cut out on the white foam portion so that the sensor plate hangs freely, add the new foam and re-assemble with the mesh head, correct? Thanks again for all the great information.
If noise is an issue you could always look at the DM10 Studio kit. The version of the kit comes with plastic/rubber cymbals more like the Roland TD-9 kit. If you want to know what the noise level of the Surge cymbal are, take a steel cookie sheet, place it on a carpeted floor and tap it with a drum stick. If you don’t have a drum stick use a wooden spoon handle. That is about how loud the Surge cymbals are. I hope that helps.
The Roland TD-9 has a dual zone hi-hat. Meaning edge and bow. The DM10 is a signal zone hi-hat. The TD-9 has dual zone crash cymbals with choke. The DM10 crash cymbals are single zone with choke. That is about all the The Roland TD-9 has over the DM10. Now here are some thing the Alesis DM10 can do that the Roland TD-9 can not.
- Assign two sounds to each trigger and mix those sound as you see fit.
- A much deeper editing system that allow you to do velocity filters. (i.e. change the pitch and/or decay of each drum the harder you hit it).
- If and when you decide to expand, the DM10 gives you access to 30+ additional triggers via MIDI (using something like an Alesis Trigger I/O).
- You can change out its base sound samples via. USB with new ones (Once Alesis actually releases new sound sets for the DM10).
- And of course the DM10 has 1/4″ inputs for each trigger on the back of the module. Something the TD-9 doesn’t have (TD-9 uses a special brake out cable).
I hope that helps.
Thanks for the hints and info Phil, gonna give the cookie sheet thing a whirl when I get back home. About your suggestion to consider the DM10 Studio over the DM10 Pro Kit for the rubber cymbal noise level, is that the only difference bewteen the two kits, besides the rack? If so, whats your immpression of those rubber cymbals. Are they reliable? I know im killin ya with questions, i really appreciate the time spent to respond. Thanks again.
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