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AR-1 Newbie seeking helpful insights. NOT PARTING!


Fasturd

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Hello All,

I am fairly new here and have been filling up on AR-9 info because I am about to start a re-fresh of a pair of those giants. I recently met a new audiophile friend who hooked me up with a very original pair of AR-1s. He knows I am a preservationist and I am in this hobby for the history and the sounds and he felt I would be a good custodian, I plan to not let him down.

This pair have serial numbers of 9672 and 11000-ish. They have their original 755As and flesh colored woofer rolls. They both seem to be working well and the pots are still functional. These were well "loved" in their previous life including surviving at least one uncaring chuck into a trash bin... A few minor dings and some compromised finish on the birch? veneer. The speaker cloth is a bit loose on one but I am hesitant to mess with it until I learn more about them. I have a variety of tube and vintage SS amps to play them with and I hope to get a pair of Dynaco MKIIIs finished to run them with this winter. 

I see that some time these were run with additional external tweeters. I find that the vintage material I have been playing sound pretty decent as is but I am not against trying some external super-tweeters. Advice how these were traditionally hooked up will be put to good use.

Any helpful preservation and maintenance tips are appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

Bill

 

AR1 FS1.jpg

AR1 FS2.jpg

AR1 FS3.jpg

AR1 FS4.jpg

AR1 FS5.jpg

AR1 FS6.jpg

AR1 FS7.jpg

AR1 FS8.jpg

AR1 FS9.jpg

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Hello Bill,

Congratulations on getting a nice pair of AR-1's in original condition. The cabinets look like birch. Your plan to keep them as is is a good one, but I'll give a couple of suggestions on how to improve their appearance, if you wish to.

The loose grill at the right side of the woofer is fairly common on these as there is only about a 1" width of grill board at that point, and it is not supported by the baffle board. My guess is that movement caused by the operating woofer over the years, along with old dried glue, allows the cloth to separate from the board. Since the cloth was glued to the board, and tucked under the frame, it's fairly easy to lift the cloth if the glue has dried.

After having success cleaning a couple of AR-3 grill cloths, I decided to see if I could remove the grill cloth from an AR-1W that I've owned for many years, which had some spots on it that I wanted to remove. That grill was loose at the same spot on the right of the woofer and I was able to remove it fairly easily. You can use a plastic putty knife underneath the cloth to work it loose from the glue. I washed the cloth in a mild solution of Simple Green and water, and it cleaned up nicely. It now resides on an AR-1 that had a damaged original grill. The pictures show the grill before and after cleaning. I used 3M-VHB (1/8" thickness) double sided tape to reattach the cloth. Your grills don't have stains so you may not want to try this, but it can be done if you feel that you want to restore some brightness. The other side of this is that if you damage the cloth, you are not likely to find an original AR cloth for a long time, so you may not want to take the risk.

The other enhancement you can do to refresh these is to simply wax the cabinets with paste wax. That will restore a nice sheen to them. The dings and abrasions from being rescued from a dumpster only enhance their beauty, in my opinion!

You're right that these do sound good with recordings of the time, but the 755A is no match for good dome mids and tweeters. If you can still hear most of the top octave you will probably like a supertweeter with these. I've not used them so I won't offer connection guidelines, I believe it depends on what model you're using.

As for preservation and maintenance, you can use RoyC's sealant on the woofer surrounds if you feel that they need it, but the half-round surround usually doesn't. Follow the installation instructions on the speaker label and play something with good low bass. That should tell you if it's operating properly. Remember that these are considered 'bookshelf' speakers, and that some boundary reinforcement is necessary for proper bass response. Out away from the walls, on stands, is not the best location.

Because of their age, I wouldn't drive these too hard (the power output of the Dynaco's should be about right). If the woofer surround or spider separates from the frame, you'll then have to remove the grill board (probably by breaking it) to get the woofer out for repair.

Good luck with these, and your AR-9's (get them a nice, big power amp!)

 

 

1W grill.jpg

1 grill.jpg

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I have a few more listening sessions under my belt with the Ar-1s and I have to say I love what they do. I think running them the last few nights has helped everything loosen up a bit.

I originally thought that they might need to have the highs augmented but there is a certain sweetness to listening to them as is especially with jazz.

It's rare that a new speaker compels my partner to comment but she sat down with me last evening and said "those really sound nice." That, my friends is a huge compliment from her! The fact that the pair match the Heywood Wakefield display case they are sitting near doesnt hurt the WAF either! 

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On 12/3/2022 at 9:36 AM, JeffS said:

Hello Bill,

Congratulations on getting a nice pair of AR-1's in original condition. The cabinets look like birch. Your plan to keep them as is is a good one, but I'll give a couple of suggestions on how to improve their appearance, if you wish to.

The loose grill at the right side of the woofer is fairly common on these as there is only about a 1" width of grill board at that point, and it is not supported by the baffle board. My guess is that movement caused by the operating woofer over the years, along with old dried glue, allows the cloth to separate from the board. Since the cloth was glued to the board, and tucked under the frame, it's fairly easy to lift the cloth if the glue has dried.

After having success cleaning a couple of AR-3 grill cloths, I decided to see if I could remove the grill cloth from an AR-1W that I've owned for many years, which had some spots on it that I wanted to remove. That grill was loose at the same spot on the right of the woofer and I was able to remove it fairly easily. You can use a plastic putty knife underneath the cloth to work it loose from the glue. I washed the cloth in a mild solution of Simple Green and water, and it cleaned up nicely. It now resides on an AR-1 that had a damaged original grill. The pictures show the grill before and after cleaning. I used 3M-VHB (1/8" thickness) double sided tape to reattach the cloth. Your grills don't have stains so you may not want to try this, but it can be done if you feel that you want to restore some brightness. The other side of this is that if you damage the cloth, you are not likely to find an original AR cloth for a long time, so you may not want to take the risk.

The other enhancement you can do to refresh these is to simply wax the cabinets with paste wax. That will restore a nice sheen to them. The dings and abrasions from being rescued from a dumpster only enhance their beauty, in my opinion!

You're right that these do sound good with recordings of the time, but the 755A is no match for good dome mids and tweeters. If you can still hear most of the top octave you will probably like a supertweeter with these. I've not used them so I won't offer connection guidelines, I believe it depends on what model you're using.

As for preservation and maintenance, you can use RoyC's sealant on the woofer surrounds if you feel that they need it, but the half-round surround usually doesn't. Follow the installation instructions on the speaker label and play something with good low bass. That should tell you if it's operating properly. Remember that these are considered 'bookshelf' speakers, and that some boundary reinforcement is necessary for proper bass response. Out away from the walls, on stands, is not the best location.

Because of their age, I wouldn't drive these too hard (the power output of the Dynaco's should be about right). If the woofer surround or spider separates from the frame. you'll then have to remove the grill board (probably by breaking it) to get the woofer out for repair.

Good luck with these, and you're AR-9's (get them a nice, big power amp!)

 

 

1W grill.jpg

1 grill.jpg

Hello Jeff,

 

Thanks for sharing your experiance. I would love to clean up the panels some day but I think that will be in their future a bit. As you stated the patina tells a story and I am in no rush to change that beyond a cleaning and possibly a good wax/polish of some sort.

Your redone AR looks fantastic. I can see that my covers which are in good shape physically are definitely dirty after almost 70 years or sitting around! My partner and I were working near our lounge all day Sunday and we had the music running all day. I am either getting used to them or they are waking up nicely. Either way I like what they offer. 

I have been slowly building a collection of vintage pieces that can bring home what it used to sound like to be a audiophile in the early days. Pretty much everyone is surprised at how good a vintage set up can sound when you take appropriate music into consideration. Enjoy!

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5 hours ago, Fasturd said:

I have a few more listening sessions under my belt with the Ar-1s and I have to say I love what they do. I think running them the last few nights has helped everything loosen up a bit.

I originally thought that they might need to have the highs augmented but there is a certain sweetness to listening to them as is especially with jazz.

It's rare that a new speaker compels my partner to comment but she sat down with me last evening and said "those really sound nice." That, my friends is a huge compliment from her! The fact that the pair match the Heywood Wakefield display case they are sitting near doesnt hurt the WAF either! 

Ha, I'm a newbie as well, just acquired a pair of 3a's. I hope I can get my wife to respond the same way!

Jazz sounds wonderful on mine too. Modern stuff not so much. I will probably recap mine, it'll be interesting to see how it goes.

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  • 2 months later...
On 12/5/2022 at 3:04 PM, sWilly said:

Ha, I'm a newbie as well, just acquired a pair of 3a's. I hope I can get my wife to respond the same way!

Jazz sounds wonderful on mine too. Modern stuff not so much. I will probably recap mine, it'll be interesting to see how it goes.

I am finding the more I use them the better they are sounding. It took a bit for them to "loosen up". Exercising the pot also helped ensure continuity to the mid. I find my self using the AR-1s quite a bit lately.

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On 12/5/2022 at 3:04 PM, sWilly said:

Ha, I'm a newbie as well, just acquired a pair of 3a's. I hope I can get my wife to respond the same way!

Jazz sounds wonderful on mine too. Modern stuff not so much. I will probably recap mine, it'll be interesting to see how it goes.

I have been using various Tube gear with the AR-1s. Including This Sherwood pair an ARC Tube pre and amp and as show in the second pic a pair of dynaco MKIV straight out of a mixer which is my favorite so far. I plan to get them hooked up to some interesting SS gear in the near future too.

AR1 Sherwood.jpg

AR1 Dynaco MKIV SoundWorkshop.jpg

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If you try removing the grills, there's a better than even chance you'll break them, so consider that as you're deciding whether you want to clean them.

You can probably conceal most of the cabinet blemishes with some lightly tinted paste wax. And if you get them into their most optimal position off those stands and into that shelving you'll only be looking at the front moldings anyway.

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