Early AR woofers

[Guest nolanpk]

Hello group. I must say, I have learned a lot just lurking on this group. I am interested in Kloss designs. I have looked at the pictures of the AR 1 and AR 3 in the library. The woofers have a ribbed cone. I have been looking at AR 3a's on ebay, and some have the ribbed woofer while some have a smoothe cone. The sellers claim that the woofers are original, maybe re-foamed or whatever, but I am suspicious of the smoothe cones. Were any 3a's made with the smoothe cone as the original? Thanks for your interesting posts.

Pat

[dynaco_dan]

Hi Pat;

Just very briefly, Pat, there has been at least half a dozen visually different woofers in the AR-1, AR-1W, AR-1X, AR-3 and AR-3A speaker systems.

This would quite likely include the various units still being offered as, "AR", replacement woofers being sold today.

TomT and a few other members have more technical information than I and will be here shortly with some excellent advice for you.

On ebay you may see AR-1's, etc, with accordian surrounds, cloth half round surrounds, foam half round surrounds, smooth cones, ribbed cones, and non-ribbed cones.

There is the cast aluminum frames of the earliest woofers used in each model and stamped steel frames on the later model production units.

There has been much debate as to whether or not the woofers of the last decade or two are sonically compatible with the originals.

This also is also differences for the AR tweeters and mids as well.

I have read where a member had bought a new AR woofer and reverted to and older used version later, there was obviously an audible difference.

I would say, not to the good, either.

There was voice coil material differences as well.

A very good question, Pat, thank you.

[Guest The Enlightened One]

The ribbed cone is a carry over from the AR-3 speakers found in the early AR-3a. My pair from 1973 has the smooth paper cone that is faded grey in color. Any cone that looks black in color and is smooth is some type of replacement.

There is one pair on ebay right now that looked suspicious but it appears the person used a smaller dust cap when redoing the surrounds. The guy with four speakers lined up in his picture used some type of aftermarket tweeter replacement.

I guess you need to do your homework before buying.