Not to mention that it was not rare to have one tom with a nice, full sound, and the one next to it sounding a bit like a plastic trash can

You still have to methodically go around the drum and tune the lugs in "star order", but the end results are a proper sounding drum ... despite not knowing what i'm doing

If you like the sound, you're good.

My son was able to easily re-torque all of the heads on his kit, and get a better sound from the kit overall.

It's by ear and feel (I remember a story about Buddy Rich getting annoyed at a guy for adjusting the wrinkle out of the outer head of his kit because he thought that the wrinkle looked bad, and Buddy said " that WAS the best bass drum sound I've had in a long

I got a great sound on my toms and kicks.

At least, this is how I used this key and it seems to work for me as my drums sound pretty good

This key has made getting a consistent sound when tuning my heads so much easier