lARrybody

Old dried out glue. You also might want to check the spacer ring on the woofer.

The dual mid/high range units do come up for sale at reasonable prices ever so often. Just be careful with them for the cones are paper thin. DxHo has a viable option. AR supplied these tweeter kits to many AR2 and AR2a owners. This would make your speakers into AR2x's. A major upgrade in frequency response and dispersion. I too have a set of AR2's that are completely original. The grills have never been off. They do sound fine, but the addition of a exterior tweeter would help them out a lot. Good luck on getting them sounding right again.

This thread answered my question.

Maybe somebody can explain to me why the upper three drivers have poly fill stuffing, but the lower dual woofer and crossover area is empty.

Wow. You are making excellent progress.

Stimpy I love stories like this. They make me feel good inside. I have a beautiful set of AR5's that I drove 60 miles to get. They have the wrong non AR woofers and I paid more than $75.00. They will eventually be restored. I also have two pairs of Euro AR5's in Teak. Both came from Cincinnati from two different sellers two weeks apart. One set had been restored and the second set has Hi-Vi tweeters. That set I got from a guy who's wife said he had to many speakers. He had two sets. The AR5's and some Bose 901's. His wife decided they would keep the 901's. I was in agreement with her.

Teledyne purchased AR in 1967, the same year the AR3a was released. The AR3 was produced till at least 1970. The ADD line was probably around 1976 or 1977. There were a lot of Advents being sold in those years. I would go with the AR3a. The AR2ax and AR4 earlier. The LST was not till 1970. All classic AR speakers.

I really do like the natural pine finish. When they were new the pine was the least expensive option. People bought them either to save a few dollars or to put in consoles. Now the pine cabinets are really desirable. Maybe because they are rarer than the Walnut veneer examples. I see the 10 in. Alnico woofers on eBay all the time. The AR 2 and AR 2a also used this woofer. There is another thread where Lakecat finds a matching speaker and completes the set. I will try to find it.

You might want to review this thread by my friend Lakecat. He goes into detail how he restored his AR3 pine cabinets.

Now you have me thinking if I added the switch correctly. I based my decision mostly on this thread by leesonic. https://www.audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/ar9-restoration-with-pics.673117/#post-8980683 The idea of eliminating the 2500 cap and letting the two woofers wired in parallel run at their natural impedance sounded interesting. Especially since I have this Crown XLS 2502 which is rated down to one ohm. I did install a safety cover so the switch could not be activated accidently. I have not tested it yet because I am currently using a Adcom GFA555II. Now I am not sure if I wired it correctly. It really doesn't matter as long as the circuit is connected in the on position. I will have to do more research. Maybe I will just go back in and solder a jumper between the two connection lugs. I am not sure if the white wire that returns to the woofer positive post should be before or after the circuit interruption. Here are the sketches I made of the lower and upper boards. The numbers are the readings of the existing components, not the new capacitors.

The 9's are finished and I have been listening to them off and on for four days now. The new caps and surrounds are starting to relax and the sound is on par with my first set. I have swapped in two different preamps, two DAC's and tomorrow I will try another power amp. They are up off the floor about 5 inches on small furniture dolly's which subdues the base a bit. The midrange is impressive. The finish on these I would rate 9 out of 10. The only imperfection is one of the speakers must of sat in the sunlight with the woofer cover installed. When it is on it is not noticeable. They have a switch installed where I can run the woofers with a 2 ohm load. I will soon be trying this. I am still looking for a set of AR9Ls or 9Lsi.

Hello Kevin Wheeler and welcome to the Classic Speaker Pages Forum. I am half Wheeler, that being my mothers madden name. One of my sons is a Kevin and his son(my grandson) is also a Kevin. We are direct descendants of General Joe Wheeler who fought in the Civil and Spanish American Wars. General Joe is buried in Arlington. I am assuming that the plastic box you are referring to is the wax filled paper box with the 20uf capacitator and the inductor coil on top. I just disconnected mine and pushed it back enough to fit the new capacitator. Here is what my 4X rebuilt crossover looked like and a drawing that I made. If you could post some images of your speakers that would be good. Again Welcome.

Its currently 95 outside now and I just finished the bottom board on the second speaker. Now to remove the upper board. I wanted to talk about some of the mods I am doing on this set. I decided to replace all the internal wiring with 16 GA Marine Grade tinned OFC copper. I ordered a box with all the correct colors from Remington Wire. The original wiring must be either 20 or 22 GA. Defiantly a big difference. I resoldered the spade connectors onto the new wire for the three upper drivers and the resister board. Pulling the new wire through the cabinets one at a time. I had to reseal the wire hole in the lower midrange basket with silicone. When it came to the woofers I took my que from KLH and soldered pigtails onto the woofer terminals and used wire nuts. Plan on getting started on the upper board right now. First remove the staples and apply heat to the back baffle and gently pry out without buggering anything up. Glad the forum is up and running again.

When I rebuilt my first set four and a half years ago I bought the Bennic's from Madisound. I bought extras thinking I would have a better chance matching them. Subsequently when Madisound discontinued them I bought more. They did not have everything so I found some at Meniscus Audio. I think they still have a couple listed. I keep a collection of different Electrolytes and Film caps. It takes me a hour to go thru and organize them. I had my choice between the MDL and Bennic caps. Comparing the leads they seem about the same. The Jantzen and Mundorf leads are defiantly nicer. The surrounds for the lower midrange are the filled-fillet Boston type supplied by our friend Rick Cobb. I don't look anywhere else unless he doesn't have what I need.

Here are the caps I used. Mostly Dayton precision poly caps. Bennic non polar electrolytes, Jansen 82uf Cross Cap for the 80uf. Yes I used Mundorf E-Caps for the 24uf value. I used two 12uf Dayton's on my first pair, but that was before I read AR Surrounds recommendations for the upper mid ranges. I like the Dayton precision caps because there is no need to match values. Even the 10% Bennic's were about 5% once paralleled. You may of noticed all the Dayton film and foil bypass caps. Here is what I have to say about that. While I will drink the Kool-Aid I am not completely sure why.

Four and a half years ago I was lucky to find a nice set of AR9's in Springfield IL. I re-capped them and put new foams on the woofers and lower midranges. I have been enjoying them ever since. Fast forward to April 23, 2022 when my nieces husband and I attended AXPONA in Chicago. There was a gentleman there with a AR hat on so I had to strike up a conversation with him. We talked about which AR models we had and I told him I was looking for a set of AR9LS or 9LSi speakers. He told me he knew someone with a nice set of AR9's in storage and wanted to get rid of them. He called his buddy and when he told me what he wanted for them I was shocked. Half what I paid for my set. Two week later I made the 2 hour drive to Ft. Wayne and brought them home. Every bit as nice as my originals and untouched except for the tweeters, but I had a set of originals waiting. My AR9,s went on temporary loan to Micha (my nieces husband) and I decided to rebuild the new set, but take my time and do with patience and forethought. I finished the first one today and my nephew helped me move it down off the saw horses and put the second one in its place. Here are some pictures. I am working in the air conditioning and not in the garage. I re-foamed the lower midrange and woofers. Replaced the AR11 tweeter. Removed the lower and upper boards. Lower and upper board rebuilt. More details coming tomorrow.

Giovanni. I am always amazed how inductors are almost always close to original specs. I guess there is not much to go wrong with a coil of wire. David. Parts Connexion has the El-caps listed. Just yesterday I was re- building a AR-9 upper board and had a 8.2 film cap for the 8 uf value. It tested at 8.4 which put it 5% over. I wound up paralleling two 3 uf and one 2 uf Dayton Precision Caps and wound up exactly at 8 uf I guess that’s what needs to be done to achieve exact values. I know that is not the best approach as far as ESR is concerned.

The electrolytes used in the 58S's are mostly Mundorf E-caps. The Jantzen Premium ELKO are basically the same as the Mundorf E-cap AC. It seems the Premium ELKO (smooth) and Mundorf (Plain) versions are slowly disappearing. Jantzen has a new El-Cap non polar with a 5% tolerance. I will be ordering some of those soon.

Stimpy is right. Same as the AR91 without the switches. Picture below is AR91 boards recapped with original AR58S board in the middle. This is the difference on the connection side.

I wish there were some pictures taken of the inside of the room.

A few years ago I decided to make my way home from Chicago not taking the interstate. Found them in a little antique shop in Lowell IN. Both still have the warranty cards attached.

I have now listened to three reference quality albums on the AR4x's. The little subs have the crossovers adjusted to about 60-70Hz and the volume less than half. I am impressed with what I am hearing. The AR4x's have been referred to as giant killers. Years ago someone in this forum gave them the name "Unfair Speakers". That's what they are. It is unfair for 54 year old 8 in 2 way speakers to sound this good. I think the SVS micros would even make them sound better. Both are sealed cabinets. No ports. One plus is that I am driving them with a SMSL AO200 amp that has separate left and right sub outs. This little class D amp punches well beyond its price point. I am going to leave the AR's hooked up for a while. I am not just saying this because I am a die hard AR, KLH and Advent man. Try not to notice the Polk towers behind them.

I have listened to the SVS 3000 Micro's. My buddy has two of them in a 2.2 arrangement with some KEF LS50Meta's. This arrangement sounds pretty darn good. I myself have the Jack Benny version in my bedroom. A pair of Q-350's on 23 in stands on top of a pair of Monoprice Premium Select 8 in. 200 watt subwoofers. It sounds just OK. I am not a fan of subwoofers in stereo music systems. I listen to my AR58S speakers in the family room and my 9's in my man cave. They don't need subwoofers. I have a pair of 1968 restored AR 4x's sitting right here. Going to swap out the KEF's and have a listen.

Those shelfs are defiantly cool. I don't think it would be to hard to make replicas.