Tama Spartan hardware | The line is complete

Every drummer has had the same thought at roughly 1am, halfway to the car with a hardware bag on one shoulder: why does this weigh more than the drums?

Tama has spent 2026 answering that. The Spartan line has been rolling out in pieces all year, and with this release it is finally finished — a hi-hat stand, a snare stand, the complete four-stand kit and a bag built for it.

So how light is light, and what do you give up to get there? Let’s find out.

What is the Spartan line?

Spartan is Tama’s lightweight series: aluminium where most stands use steel, single-braced where most use double, and a shared set of features across all four stands.

The engineering language is consistent, and it is worth knowing what the names mean:

• Glide-Tite Grip Joints — Tama’s patented joint, metal-to-metal rather than plastic-on-metal, so a tube clamped at height stays at that height.
• Toothless Quick-Set Tilters — no gear teeth, so the angle is stepless. You get the angle you want rather than the nearest notch to it.
• Quick-Set Cymbal Mates — one-touch cymbal changes, no wing nut to drop into the carpet.
• Anti-walk rubber feet — stands that creep across a stage during a gig are a genuine problem, and this is the cheap fix for it.

Two of the four stands landed earlier in the year. This release adds the other two.

The new hi-hat stand: HH75DS

Aluminium throughout — centre pipe assembly and footboard alike — with a two-leg design.

Two legs matters more than it sounds. A three-legged hi-hat stand is stable, but the third leg is always in the way of a double pedal or a left-side rack tom, and every drummer with a double kick has spent time rotating legs to find a compromise. Two legs removes the argument.

You get a direct pull-action mechanism, adjustable spring tension, adjustable footboard angle, a double-braced base and a reinforced footboard. Note that: the base is double-braced even though the rest of the line is single. Sensible, because a hi-hat stand takes force in a way a cymbal stand does not.

The wing nuts have smooth threads rather than toothed ones, which is a small thing that you notice every single time you set up.

Weight is 5.1lb, and it is around $149.99.

The new snare stand: HS70S

Hollow structural aluminium arms on a single-braced base.

The basket expands to take 12” to 14” snares — the kit listing says up to 15”, so if you play a 15” snare, check before you buy — with rubber cushions on the arms and anti-walk feet underneath.

The tilter is the toothless Quick-Set type, so the angle is stepless. Anyone who has ever wanted their snare just slightly flatter than one notch allows will understand why this is on the list.

Around $119.99, and it was already showing sold out at some dealers while we were writing this.

The full kit: HS4S

This is the one most people will buy. Four stands in a box:

• HC72S straight cymbal stand — 3.7lb
• HC73BS boom cymbal stand — 4.4lb
• HS70S snare stand
• HH75DS hi-hat stand — 5.1lb

Around $479.99 for the set, against roughly $150 + $120 + $95 + $105 bought separately, so the kit saves you a little rather than a lot.

The boom stand goes from 730mm to 1,705mm (28¾” to 67⅛”) with a 300mm boom arm, on 28.6mm base tubing, and uses a Duo-Lock boom tilter that sets the boom angle and length in one movement.

But the number that matters is the weight. Nothing in this kit breaks 5.1lb, and the two cymbal stands are under 4.5lb each. A conventional double-braced boom stand routinely weighs 8 to 10lb on its own. Across four stands, that is the difference between one trip to the car and two.

The bag: SBH02L

Built for the Spartan kit specifically. 880mm x 150mm x 200mm (34⅝” x 5⅞” x 7⅞”), 600-denier water-resistant fabric, 10mm padding and a padded shoulder strap. Around £34.99 in the UK.

A hardware bag with 10mm of cushioning is not armour, but that is rather the point — heavy padding on a bag full of lightweight stands would be self-defeating.

Is lightweight hardware actually a good idea?

Mostly yes, with honest limits.

The case for it is obvious if you gig. Weight is the reason drummers arrive at soundcheck already tired, and it is the reason a lot of players quietly stop taking the third cymbal stand. Cutting a full hardware pack down by fifteen or twenty pounds changes how a gig feels before you have played a note.

The case against is physics, and it does not go away because a stand is well made.

Mass is what resists movement. A single-braced aluminium stand with a heavy 22” ride hung off the end of a fully extended boom is going to move more than a double-braced steel one — not fall over, but nod on the beat and creep over three sets. If you play hard, and hang big cymbals a long way out, that is a real consideration and no amount of clever jointing removes it.

The other thing to watch is what the stands are for. Lightweight lines exist for gigging, teaching, touring with flight cases and small stages. If your kit lives in one room and never moves, you are paying for a benefit you will never use — a heavier stand will hold a cymbal more solidly for less money.

There is also a nice middle path. Nobody says a hardware pack has to be all one line. Spartan stands for the cymbals you carry, a heavier stand for the ride that takes the abuse, and you have solved most of the weight problem without the compromise where it counts.

Where can I buy one?

The right shop depends on where you are: Guitar Center in the Americas, Gear4music in the UK, or Thomann for Europe and the rest of the world.

Prices above are US street prices — Tama had not published UK and European list pricing for the new pieces on the pages we checked, so let your local dealer tell you the real number rather than converting from dollars.

Final thoughts

Hardware is the least exciting thing a drum company makes and the thing you interact with most. A completed lightweight line is genuinely good news, and the weight figures here are the real product, not the marketing.

Buy it if you carry your own gear. Think twice if your kit never leaves the house and you hit hard.

For more on the stands that hold everything up, our guide to the Pearl curved boom arm stand covers the other end of the design argument, and the bass drum cymbal mount piece is about removing stands from the setup altogether — which is, when you think about it, the lightest hardware of all.

Tama has had a busy few weeks besides this. We have also covered the new Erskine and Nilles signature snares and the new finishes and limited editions.