AR-14 restore

[PatK]

Greetings.  First post on here.  I recently acquired a pair of AR-14s.  Did not pay much for them but upon inspection I noticed that they required a complete speaker rebuild.  The previous owner must have blown the woofers and replaced them with Pyle Industry speakers.  Was finally able to find a pair of AR 10" to install.  The tweeters were replaced with what looked to be Peerless tweeters cut down to match the original tweeters.  Have managed to find a place that sells original stock AR parts.  My main question is the grill covers.  Were these the foam type of were they wooden frames covered with fabric?  And does anyone know if they are available thru a supplier?

[AR55]

The AR-14 came with a foam grill.  The grill was identical to the grills that came with AR-10, AR-11 & AR-12.   I purchased my AR-14's in 1979 and the grills are still in good condition, but many times you will find that speakers were stored in a basement or garage and the grills have deteriorated.  The grills on the AR-11's that I picked-up and restored a few years back were like that.  I was fortunate to find original replacement grills still in the box on eBay for a very reasonable price.

I don't know of anyone that makes a replacement foam grill for the 14.  Vintage-AR sells custom fabric grills through eBay that mimic the look of the of the original foam grills.  They are a little pricey - $105/pair.

 

[JKent]

Welcome Pat

These guys will make foam grilles http://foamspeakergrilles.com

You must REALLY want to restore those. Between the woofers, tweeters and grilles it's gonna cost you.

Also--be skeptical of any place claiming to sell "original stock AR parts." I suppose it's possible for the AR-14 (and if it's ebay seller Vintage_AR you can trust him).

Good luck with those.

-Kent

[djcheung]

This is my AR14 that I refoamed some years ago.

I still haven't done anything with the disintegrated foam grills yet. Mostly will make up something using a wooden frame.

[AR55]

Pat,

R Lowe posted very detailed measurements of the foam grills in metric about 4 years ago.  Below is a link to that post:

http://www.classicspeakerpages.net/IP.Board/index.php?/topic/8171-ar14-foam-grill/

Note that he states that the length of the grills are actually 51.5 cm (20.25"), and not the 51 cm shown in the pdf.  The 51.5 cm agrees with my measurements.  Also, I measured the overall thickness of the foam to be 3 cm (1-1/8").

Since the original grills were meant to be used with 4 different speakers, the "milling-out" of the back side of the foam for the drivers is rather extensive.   However, you really only need to mill-out for the AR-14's 10" woofer and 1" tweeter.  My guess is that foamspeakergrilles.com price will probably be in the same neighborhood as Vintage-AR's fabric grills. 

As I said in my earlier post, I was lucky to find someone selling 30-year old replacement grills from AR that were still in the box.  I have occasionally seen the grills show up on eBay, when someone is parting speakers, but often their condition is not that great.

 

 

[JKent]

1 hour ago, AR55 said:

My guess is that foamspeakergrilles.com price will probably be in the same neighborhood as Vintage-AR's fabric grills. 

Probably. I paid $75 for a pair for Cizek KA-1s.

Another option would be to make your own frames and cover them with stretchy speaker cloth. Glenn made some that looked very nice with a beveled edge that gave them the look of the original foam. Or make flat grilles and cover with linen for a more "classic era" look.