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Allison One Gold....info wanted


lakecat

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48 minutes ago, lakecat said:

Hi folks. Looking for info on these speakers. Seems to be a later model of the ones. Opinions?.....pricing? Has his signature. Thanks for any replies.

A "signature" Allison One was introduced by David Faulkner sometime after 2000 when they tried unsuccessfully to restart Allison Acoustics.

That loudspeaker, along with a similarly revamped model 4, made it to the CES show back then in Vegas.

I suppose one could speculate all day as to why the venture bombed out, but it was a shame indeed, as many of us had high hopes about bringing it back.

I think that sig. one was retailing for 5 grand.

Bill

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Interesting.  I would imagine th $5,000 price tag had something to do with the failure.  Never bring back an old design of this type of technology for high $.  it wont compute in peoples minds.

Looks like they were pushing it for home theater.  They reivented the grilles apparently too.

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1 hour ago, DavidDru said:

Interesting.  I would imagine th $5,000 price tag had something to do with the failure.  Never bring back an old design of this type of technology for high $.  it wont compute in peoples minds.

Looks like they were pushing it for home theater.  They reivented the grilles apparently too.

The 5K tag was only for the signature and if I recall the New A1 was retailed at around 3400.

Roy A. had already successfully marketed Home Theater loudspeakers before this with his RA labs company.

I don't know how it was thought, that building a surround sound layout of the three VERY expensive models introduced was going to fly (and it didn't in the end.) The Allison 3 by the way, was the other model re-introduced.

For myself, the discussion about it and the following literature was almost painful to read and look at. (No subwoofer necessary) always stuck out in my mind.

By then, I had integrated my own pair of Allison Ones into a Home Theater layout and I knew, ignoring the demands of movie tracks with loud (and low frequency) explosions and all the rest, that too often goes lower than what the A1 woofers were built to deal with was fatal.

The new grilles were also a problem. They appear like those used by RA on the IC20 venture, but instead of a clean, thin frame covered with thin cloth, the new ones were built with only holes cut out just large enough to expose the drivers. I never had hands on them myself, but it was said by others that the wide design dispersion of the drivers may have been compromised by too small an opening for only the face of the driver itself.

Bill

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15 hours ago, lakecat said:

Thanks for reply. Still haven't seen an opinion of the sound. 

You might want to subscribe to the Yahoo "Allison Loudspeaker" group. (If anything is still going on there). Roy Allison was a member of that group and back when the new A1 came out, there was one person who had a sample pair and performed extensive test measurements on them, with very good results, much similar to the original, that I owned for 35 years.

Curious if you have or have listened to the Original Allison One?

 

Bill

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Good morning....and no I have not heard them. There is a pair for sale near me and before I took the time to drive an hour to see them and hear them, I wondered if anyone here had any thoughts on them. Original owner and look very clean. With it being so rare I guess, I am concerned about finding parts for these speakers if needed. For two grand, I may pass.

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1 hour ago, lakecat said:

Good morning....and no I have not heard them. There is a pair for sale near me and before I took the time to drive an hour to see them and hear them, I wondered if anyone here had any thoughts on them. Original owner and look very clean. With it being so rare I guess, I am concerned about finding parts for these speakers if needed. For two grand, I may pass.

That's a tough call, especially if you have not experienced the wide dispersion sound of the Allison One. I've been hooked on it since 1977 and it's been a progression ever since, now adding cutting edge electronics (not even cd's were available when the A1 was introduced) to bring out all the great sound they can deliver.

I would make the trip if you can arrange a demo...at two grand those speakers probably will go nowhere for quite some time. That being said, if they are indeed pristine, an offer of 1500 would be a good starting point, I believe.

You never have to worry about the woofers, since they can be serviced by a number of competent outfits. (I use Miller Sound, but there are quite a few others)

The real trick is having a spare of the 3way tweeter and midrange.

The originals of those will fit in that Gold version, except the oldest with the outside wires would be a problem. Between roughly 1980 up to the last, those mids and tweets had rear connections that would be fine with those units.

Ironically, I own a full set of the actual drivers that are installed in the speakers you may be visiting.

 

Bill

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Lakecat,

$2,000 is crazy, although I would love it if it wasn't crazy. :D  I paid $400 for mine and they are near mint.

They are a lovely speaker, no doubt.  And I was recently able to get a full set of replacement drivers plus one additional woofer for a decent price.  I don't really challenge mine too much.  I office here in my house and I use them there just about every day with a Pioneer SA-9100 that has been fully recapped.  The thing I worry about most are the grilles.

 

I am a member of the Yahoo Allison group and sometimes peruse various threads there.  (right now I am working on a pair of Allison AL-120's)  That is the most cumbersome web site to use.  Way too hard to find anything or even read entire threads.  Hell, the thread titles are not even fully shown when looking at the list of topics.  It's frankly awful.

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1 hour ago, DavidDru said:

Lakecat,

$2,000 is crazy, although I would love it if it wasn't crazy. :D  I paid $400 for mine and they are near mint.

They are a lovely speaker, no doubt.  And I was recently able to get a full set of replacement drivers plus one additional woofer for a decent price.  I don't really challenge mine too much.  I office here in my house and I use them there just about every day with a Pioneer SA-9100 that has been fully recapped.  The thing I worry about most are the grilles.

 

I am a member of the Yahoo Allison group and sometimes peruse various threads there.  (right now I am working on a pair of Allison AL-120's)  That is the most cumbersome web site to use.  Way too hard to find anything or even read entire threads.  Hell, the thread titles are not even fully shown when looking at the list of topics.  It's frankly awful.

To be fair, it's important to compare apples to apples.

Of course, we are talking about the signature series cabinets from 2002, autographed by Roy himself.

The pricing was vastly different from the original series A1's.

I paid 760.00 for my original pair brand new back in 1977.

Hey! I'm with you and prefer the original, but 25 years into the future changed the prices dramatically.

(A shot below of my A1's before my Ebay guy picked them up)

In case you guys never saw it.....the other of the three from 2002....a shot of the "new" Allison three.

 

121121_0001 (2).jpg

46c8_3.jpg

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On ‎2‎/‎6‎/‎2017 at 7:47 AM, newandold said:

So sorry to hear that.

For years I bought used Allison parts and complete speakers.

half the battle can be who you're dealing with. A poor communicator is better to walk away from.

Bill

Last question. What would you give for a nice pair of Signatures? Just curious as he emailed me today. Thanks.

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58 minutes ago, lakecat said:

Last question. What would you give for a nice pair of Signatures? Just curious as he emailed me today. Thanks.

If they are physically in like new condition and I were happy with the audition, I would offer 1500 tops.

The signature aspect of the loudspeaker makes no difference to me.

Bill

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On 2/9/2017 at 9:05 PM, lakecat said:

Thanks Bill.....big help.

I'm gonna echo Newandold's take on these. In this economy I'm afraid vintage speakers, no matter how good and/or how rare, remain hard to sell at top dollar. I know of a pair of mint Allison Ones for sale at $1200 and they have not budged for a month. I've had my own pair of Mint Fours up on CL for a couple weeks at a bottom feeder price of $295 and no one has even inquired. I don't know where you are, but if those were near me ( New York) the seller would be lucky to get $1500.

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Some confusion here it seems....

There are two pair of speakers being discussed here.

So far we have seen no pictures posted of the "Signature" Allisons that were going for two grand. (From the "gold post")

This Craigslist for an original pair of A1's is a different pair all together.

Regarding those, they look good and have had the usual things done to A1's that have seen a lot of action.

The woofers are re foamed, but I would ask how long ago they were done.

All the tweeters have been replaced with newer, original Allison tweeters which is also perfectly fine (hopefully all 3 way versions).

Also, I notice the Allison logo badges are missing from both grilles.

Bill

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10 hours ago, newandold said:
 
Feb 1, 2017 ... FOR SALE Allison One Gold Signature Series Audio Speakers Personally signed by Acoustic Engineer extraordinaire Roy Allison himself!
pittsburgh.craigslist.org
pittsburgh.craigslist.org/ele/5984579862.html

Those are the ones..... he has emailed me back but have not got back to him. Says he has a very low end amp to hear with..... soooo....

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Hearing is EVERYTHING, especially if one is a newcomer to the sound of Allisons.

If the seller has a receiver of at least 50 wpc and you can demo with some of your favorites, that should be enough.

Everyone "hears" differently, so at the end of the day, it's your call.

Try to demo with the speakers against the wall, 3 to 4 feet away from a corner to get the proper bass response.

Bill

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  • 2 weeks later...

The biggest problem (in my opinion) with selling the original A1, is the fact that they are 40 years old, and housing so many old drivers that have those delicate wires exposed.

The newest of the old allisons did away with the wires exposed and the wooden bezels years before the company went out however, these still got em.

its a lot of money to be up a creak without a paddle if you loose a driver.

 

Bill

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On 2/23/2017 at 10:23 PM, newandold said:

The biggest problem (in my opinion) with selling the original A1, is the fact that they are 40 years old, and housing so many old drivers that have those delicate wires exposed.

The newest of the old allisons did away with the wires exposed and the wooden bezels years before the company went out however, these still got em.

its a lot of money to be up a creak without a paddle if you loose a driver.

 

Bill

I agree. Many of us have been swept up by the Allison raves only to discover issues that are really tough to overcome. I've got a pair of Fours here that I refoamed and bought a replacement tweeter for. The tweeter cost well over $100. I've since learned that Allison put ferrofluid in the Fours tweeters. I think they are too delicate to be taken apart for a fluid replacement and if I try it and blow it there's no other replacement tweet anywhere on the horizon. Point is I now suspect that I'm not hearing these fours as they were meant to sound.

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