Hi all,
Have a question on the above discussion - could anyone with experience of both explain what the audible difference between using the AR3a mid (with the final crossover from the schematic) is compared to the AR3 mid with one of the earlier crossovers is?
Long story short I got hold of a pair of AR3s that had been factory modified to AR3a back in the 70s and due to the state they were in when I got to them I decided it would be best to get them back to AR3 for a number of reasons. The one drawback of doing this (or the main one I guess) is that it's very challenging to get AR3 Mids and the one piece of these speakers that didn't needed replacing was the AR3a mid that they came with.
Once someone pointed out that AR themselves actually used AR3a mids in AR3s at the end of production with a different crossover I assumed that they wouldn't have rolled them out and sold them to people if they sounded noticeably different to earlier iterations, particularly if it was worse, so went with this option. Seems dangerous reputationally. But obviously read the above conversation and now am worried that a) they won't sound right once I finish them in a week or two and b) resale value will be much lower.
I planned to sell these on one day as just a standard refurbed pair of AR3s (they have alinco woofers, AR3 tweeters and a pair of mids that were used by AR in AR3s, and I've got a decent crossover in there made up of jantzen coils, Mundorf Mcap EVOs and Jantzen Silver Z-caps) that in all honesty in my opinion I was hoping someone would recognize that they should sound better than a lot of stuff that is being sold as 'original' on Epay for $2000-$4000.
Now I deliberately built the crossover using two 15uf caps for the 30uf, so I could remove a 15uf and replace with 9uf and remove a coil if a pair of AR3 mids miraculously turn up for a reasonable price (unlikely I think) to get to the original AR3 24uf crossover, but I ask this question partly because in the future, the way I am having to do this may be one of the only ways to re-build a pair of AR3s and I'm still kind of blown away that they may sound inferior or at least not true to the original AR3 sound. Perhaps I misread and AR3 considered the last iteration of the AR3 an improvement and those who are used to the older ones will just notice it's different, but wanted to check.
Any thoughts much appreciated, I want to do right by these AR3s!