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AR 3a Grill Cloth


Guest cocobaydiver

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Guest cocobaydiver

Hi Guys.....This is my first post. I have been reading hundreds of past posts for about the past two months in preparation for buying a set of AR's.

As an aside, looking for specific information here is like looking for a specific diamond in a big bucket of diamonds. You eventually find the diamond but, man, what other fantastic diamonds you get to see in the process! Just an incredible incredible amount of knowledge.

With the gracious tutoring of Tom Tyson, I just picked up a nice set of 1967 - 1969 3a's from E-bay. But they will need new grill cloth because one has a hole in the corner.

I've read the past posts on grill cloth in 2001 thru 2003. Here's my question - Layne Audio says on his website that they have Original 3a grills with cloth (says found in an Italian warehouse) in excellent shape ($85.00) If they are that old and in a warehouse, what do you think of their condition re could they look good but be weak or rotten? Has anybody on the forum bought a set? JOE, is this what you bought a couple of years ago? I haven't talked to Layne directly yet (I know that can be tough). They might be the later "off-white" color, I don't know yet. Also, how about the slight size difference between different years of AR 3a's as far as grills. Could this be an issue with the cloth already attached to the grill frame?

Next, "DOGMENINRENO", you said back in June 2002 that you have three different swatches of cloth. Is that still available?

I've also seen a seller on e-bay (vintage-ar) that advertizes a near-identical to the original cloth for 3a's ($35.00). Says some of the weave threading is just a little heavier. I definately want the earlier "beige-white" color if that can be identified as such.

Also, I think it was Tom that mentioned in a past post about AB Tech Sevices having cloth.

I suppose at some point, accoustic transparancy is going to come into play here in a cloth reproduction, although I don't know how to figure that one out.

That's all for now, my question mark button is getting hot.

Thanks very much for your advice..........Skip

:-)

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Guest dogmeninreno

>Hi Guys.....This is my first post. I have been reading

>hundreds of past posts for about the past two months in

>preparation for buying a set of AR's.

>

>As an aside, looking for specific information here is like

>looking for a specific diamond in a big bucket of diamonds.

>You eventually find the diamond but, man, what other fantastic

>diamonds you get to see in the process! Just an incredible

>incredible amount of knowledge.

>

>With the gracious tutoring of Tom Tyson, I just picked up a

>nice set of 1967 - 1969 3a's from E-bay. But they will need

>new grill cloth because one has a hole in the corner.

>

>I've read the past posts on grill cloth in 2001 thru 2003.

>Here's my question - Layne Audio says on his website that they

>have Original 3a grills with cloth (says found in an Italian

>warehouse) in excellent shape ($85.00) If they are that old

>and in a warehouse, what do you think of their condition re

>could they look good but be weak or rotten? Has anybody on the

>forum bought a set? JOE, is this what you bought a couple of

>years ago? I haven't talked to Layne directly yet (I know that

>can be tough). They might be the later "off-white" color, I

>don't know yet. Also, how about the slight size difference

>between different years of AR 3a's as far as grills. Could

>this be an issue with the cloth already attached to the grill

>frame?

>

>Next, "DOGMENINRENO", you said back in June 2002 that you have

>three different swatches of cloth. Is that still available?

>

>I've also seen a seller on e-bay (vintage-ar) that advertizes

>a near-identical to the original cloth for 3a's ($35.00). Says

>some of the weave threading is just a little heavier. I

>definately want the earlier "beige-white" color if that can be

>identified as such.

>

>Also, I think it was Tom that mentioned in a past post about

>AB Tech Sevices having cloth.

>

>I suppose at some point, accoustic transparancy is going to

>come into play here in a cloth reproduction, although I don't

>know how to figure that one out.

>

>That's all for now, my question mark button is getting hot.

>

>Thanks very much for your advice..........Skip

>:-)

Well, I still have many yards of the 3 shades of linen. Send me your address and

I would be happy to send you 3 samples of the fabric but I must inform you that it will cost you $55.00 per linear yard plus $5.00 shipping which is 72" wide.

I will cut to order and to redo a set of AR3a's and it will be $45.00 total for both plus $5.00 shipping or a total of $50.00 . Dale

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If you are looking to restore the original appearance of your loudspeaker, you have no choice except to hunt down the dwindling supply of the exact fabric and pay the going rate. Depending on how it was stored, it may be in anywhere from excellent to awful condition.

If you want to make your own, I see no reason to pay for "speaker grill cloth" from a speaker building supplier. This can be both restrictive and an unnecessary expense. I had the same problem when I purchased my demo AR9s (grillcloths were damaged and not under warranty) and wasn't going to pay AR's price.

I went to a local fabric store and picked out an open weave fabric which was visibly opaque, in my case black. I tested it by putting it over my ear and gently rubbing my fingers together so that I could barely hear them. I listened very carefully both with a layer of cloth and without and when I found samples where the sound was indistinguishable, I bought the least expensive one. Although any grill cloth will cause some measurable attenuation especially at high frequencies, I feel that my method was satisfactory. I believe some manufacturers actually design their speakers' responses to compensate for the absorption.

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>If you are looking to restore the original appearance of your

>loudspeaker, you have no choice except to hunt down the

>dwindling supply of the exact fabric and pay the going rate.

>Depending on how it was stored, it may be in anywhere from

>excellent to awful condition.

Good luck on this. The original beige linen used on the late-1960s AR speakers is no longer available anywhere, so far as I can tell. There is no dwindling supply; it's gone. It was a custom linen produced specifically for AR, I believe, first used on the 1965 AR-4x, but was discontinued after around 1973 or 1974. When AR began fastening grill panels with Velcro rather than using hot-melt glue, the grill-cloth material changed to a less-desirable, thicker, denser-weave white linen. This later grill material tended to muffle the already reticent sound of most 60s and 70s AR speakers. Even AR's Customer Service Department and, subsequently, AB Tech Services, had to use this white material for replacement grills after the early 1970s.

Probably the closest thing to the original is our friend in Reno who has a supply of Italian linen in three different shades, including a beige color. The samples he sent me were pretty close (not exact) to the original, but the closest I've seen. The important "test," so-to-speak, is the arbitrary "50%-light test," whereby you look through the grill and hope to see at least 50% light through it. Supposedly if you can see 50% through the material, it will pass sound without too much high-ffequency attenuation. This test is obviously very inexact and non-scientific, but it is an old hi-fi guide to grill-cloth material selection. You can, of course, go to great lenths (AR did this with the beige linen material they chose for the 60s ARs) and measure the response with and without the grill material. I think the attenuation with the original grill panels in place was about 1 dB or less, if I remember correctly.

--Tom Tyson

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The 50% open weave is a good figure. What I did was to hold it up and look through it and was able to see fairly clearly and then held it against a surface and couldn't see much of the surface. Of course, Black cloth against a black painted wood is relatively easy. Light colors are much tougher.

Those people who are obsessed with an authentic restoration have the most frustrating time. If functionality is the issue, it should be borne in mind that even the custom weave originally used came down to one person's esthetic opinion. Sometimes there is no other choice than to give up the past. Of course, if you could get a sample, even a small swatch and send it to someone who does custom weaving, you could get all new stock and corner the market. (too bad thre are no emoticons here to post)

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Guest Brian_D

I'm afraid that's a teeenie tiny market when the textiles industry is concerned!

you could probably re-grille every AR3 in existance with 1000 yards of fabric, and most mill order minimums are around 5000 yards (if you want less, the price skyrockets abuot $.05 PER YARD for every 500 feet less than the minimum. Cotton (linen) weaves are even worse, some mills in asia want 10,000 yards minimum.

(I used to spec fabric for a t-shirt printing business... big fun)

-Brian

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You are of course absolutely right. I was thinking back about a TV program I saw about high tech textile milling in India where cost is very low and they can set up for relatively small production runs of custom orders. Now if you could just get the guy who owns one of those factories excited about restoring AR3s you could get him to absorb the cost. Maybe he'd like to corner the market. Of course if you could persuade someone who needs to order material milled for an entirely different purpose that this is the cloth they want, well. Anybody for AR3 grill cloth tee shirts and bathing suits? How about an AR3 raincoat!

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Guest rickcee

Yep, I'm in. pretty sure when I win ny 4th lottery I'm gonna restart prod. on the Dynaco kits and AR spks, all the 1969 models. anticipating big rewards.

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Guest cocobaydiver

Thanks! Very useful information on the AR grill cloth.

Hey, when you restart Dynaco and AR production, as a side business, why not bring back the 1960's Heathkit? When other kids my age were sneaking around reading Playboy, I was immersed in HeathKit, Allied and Lafayette catalogs. (It did change later though).

Sad (?) thing is, I think I was just as aroused reading those catalogs as they were reading their Playboys. But hey, I bet those 1960's Playmates aren't in as good shape as my 1968 AR 3as will be!

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