The Hosbilt™ drive to create drums was born from a search for a sound that couldn't be achieved from any marching bass drums available on the market. Hosbilt™ owner Craig Colquhoun's thought on the situation was "I always had this idea that a bass drum could sound like an upright bass in a jazz band. I knew that the sound I wanted could only come from a free floating shell like the old rope tensioned drums, but rope drums are very difficult to maintain tension on. So I came up with the idea to use a turnbuckle to draw the counter hoops together evenly without a drum key." It has been said that the evolution of rope tension drums has come to the present by the Hosbilt™ tensioning system".

Many other bands liked what they heard out of Craig's own drum and very soon they began to ask if he would make some for them also. From there, the demand exploded rapidly and soon Craig realized that there was a real demand for these instruments in the market.

In a remarkably short period of time the extraordinary Hosbilt™ drums have forever changed the sound of the modern day Pipe Band. Since their inception they have been accepted as the new standard in sound. Hosbilt™ bass and tenor drums have won no less than 5 winners of the Best Bass Section award at the World Pipe Band Championships have played Hosbilt™ bass and tenor drums.