Couldn't resist! Now what? Franken-3a

[stupidhead]

the drivers have arrived!

Huge kudos to George (ligs) for every thing about this deal. The packaging was top shelf and I now have a set of cloth surround woofers for my project. Here is an example of the thoughtful prep and packaging for these monsters which arrived yesterday without incident.

I am not going to go into the details of this acquisition, just let it be said that George is a very generous member and these items will be used and enjoyed for years to come.

 

[stupidhead]

Not great pics here. I will stash these woofers away until needed, much cabinet and xover work first. The tweeters, or are they mids, are in need of evaluation and hopefully rehab. I am just not sure what we have here. I have seen this type of AR driver but not caged? I believe them to be 4500 part number but see images with dampening material under cage, these have none? They weigh in at a whopping 9.6 lbs. and have 063 stamp on back. The second one's cage has been removed and was not in the shipment. The vc appears to have separated and hoping someone will chime in with encouraging thoughts on this. Gotta head out for work but wanted to share this exciting development.

Thanx again ligs, I will show them the respect they deserve.

 

 

 

 

[der]

Wow, that's great! You're on your way now. Congrats.

der

[JKent]

This is fantastic Geoff!

Your quest to restore them to all-original is a noble one, given Roy's comment that yours are very early specimens.

I know what you mean about the weight of those early mids! The mids I pulled from my 3s were monsters like that and the tweets were a good 5 pounds IIRC! I wonder if the original owner removed the fiberglass as some sort of mod or mis-directed "improvement"?

But on to more pressing matters: Will the packing of your woofers as shown in the post at the top of the page lend a lyechee nut flavor to the sound? And next time I drive up to Maine can I see your beautiful renovations if I bring a 6-pack of craft beer? 

-Kent

[RoyC]

7 hours ago, stupidhead said:

Not great pics here. I will stash these woofers away until needed, much cabinet and xover work first. The tweeters, or are they mids, are in need of evaluation and hopefully rehab. I am just not sure what we have here. I have seen this type of AR driver but not caged? I believe them to be 4500 part number but see images with dampening material under cage, these have none? They weigh in at a whopping 9.6 lbs. and have 063 stamp on back. The second one's cage has been removed and was not in the shipment. The vc appears to have separated and hoping someone will chime in with encouraging thoughts on this. Gotta head out for work but wanted to share this exciting development.

Geoff,

Those are nice looking woofers. Make sure the masonite rings of their surrounds and spiders are securely glued to the woofer basket. Like the AR-3 mids in your photos, these are very early specimens, and the adhesive holding the rings is often found to be failing.

The AR-3 mid(s) in your photos is the earliest version of the first mid, which did not have fiberglass on the dome. I have had some success repairing and restoring AR-3 mids, and it is likely even your intact mid will need work to perform acceptably. They all had the metal screen over the dome. One of your screens is obviously missing.

Another possibility would be to send the mids to Chris. I've discussed the overall plight of the AR-3 midrange driver with him, and he is pretty sure he can duplicate the voice coil (as he has done with the AR-3a tweeter), and re-attach it to the old dome. If he is able to construct a faithful reproduction of the voice coil, with the added benefit of using copper instead of aluminum voice coil wire, it will be very welcome news to the AR-3 world.

Roy

[stupidhead]

8 hours ago, der said:

Wow, that's great! You're on your way now. Congrats.

der

thanx der, there is more yet to come on this. as my wife says "sometimes the pizza lands cheese side up".

6 hours ago, JKent said:

This is fantastic Geoff!

Your quest to restore them to all-original is a noble one, given Roy's comment that yours are very early specimens.

I know what you mean about the weight of those early mids! The mids I pulled from my 3s were monsters like that and the tweets were a good 5 pounds IIRC! I wonder if the original owner removed the fiberglass as some sort of mod or mis-directed "improvement"?

But on to more pressing matters: Will the packing of your woofers as shown in the post at the top of the page lend a lyechee nut flavor to the sound? And next time I drive up to Maine can I see your beautiful renovations if I bring a 6-pack of craft beer? 

-Kent

hey Kent, again thanx for the encouragement. I have started to evaluate the cabs and while they are solid will need a good deal of work to be right. this saga is going to get quite interesting by later on this week as there will be more components to pick from. more to come on that in a few days.

as for stopping in on your way to Maine, of course. we have a spare bedroom you could use and depending on where in Maine you are going Jersey to Maine is a hike! please let us know if such a trip is in the offing and know that the door is always open. on the craft beer thing, no need to bring unless you have a favorite. in fact funny you mention this as I was thinking I will utilize the beer cellar to stash various drivers as my work shop has become a bit cluttered. maybe I should take some pics of that and post. 

44 minutes ago, RoyC said:

Geoff,

Those are nice looking woofers. Make sure the masonite rings of their surrounds and spiders are securely glued to the woofer basket. Like the AR-3 mids in your photos, these are very early specimens, and the adhesive holding the rings is often found to be failing.

The AR-3 mid(s) in your photos is the earliest version of the first mid, which did not have fiberglass on the dome. I have had some success repairing and restoring AR-3 mids, and it is likely even your intact mid will need work to perform acceptably. They all had the metal screen over the dome. One of your screens is obviously missing.

Another possibility would be to send the mids to Chris. I've discussed the overall plight of the AR-3 midrange driver with him, and he is pretty sure he can duplicate the voice coil (as he has done with the AR-3a tweeter), and re-attach it to the old dome. If he is able to construct a faithful reproduction of the voice coil, with the added benefit of using copper instead of aluminum voice coil wire, it will be very welcome news to the AR-3 world.

Roy

Hi Roy,

pm sent on a bit of this but thanx for chiming in. I will certainly inspect the woofers and thanx for the guidance as usual.

adding this pic just because I like it and I know the audience!

[stupidhead]

So an update on these. After a bit more dialog with ligs he offered to send the rest of the set he had extracted the old drivers from. They arrived Wednesday without incident as they were once again packed very well. Much to my surprise after unpacking it became apparent that the cabs had been modified somewhere along their life journey. ligs indicates he got these from a thrift and has no knowledge of who, where or why. They had each been veneered on all flanks with a veneer of plywood, approximately 5/16" thick with what appears to be a walnut finish. The tops had a 7/8" piece of plywood with a formica finish. The bottoms had been fashioned with a set of quality casters. My impression of all of this that it had been done quite a long time ago and had been done by someone with skills.

Here are some pics for reference.

oh yeah, the grilles are in place but frames are both compromised. no badges.

one of the formica surfaces is peeling away a bit

pretty sure I see a layer of original veneer under that plywood on the original exterior of cabinet. by the way, the casters are genius. rolling these about as opposed to carrying is a snap.

yeah that is a veneer on the original faces. I have not efforted any removal yet but I have hope. What thought process lead someone to do this is unclear. Yet another challenge on this mash up of speakers.

[stupidhead]

The serials are very close, undoubtedly bought as a set.

and the remaining drivers appear to be all there with a bit of separation on one.

and the front wiring terminal is different than I have seen on most.

 

This project is evolving into a Frankenspeaker thing for sure.

[ra.ra]

Odd cabinet "upgrades" indeed, but thx for the very good pics. Seems to be no plywood panel on bottoms - - despite the casters, have you inspected the original veneer condition/species on this surface? 

[lakecat]

Well.....that is ONE WAY to keep the plant stains off your veneer!!...lol. Does it look glued on or nailed on? That looks to be a big friggin' mess to deal with. You took excellent pics of the speakers and I never saw that driver connection before either. Certainly a pair that has seen some history for sure.

[lARrybody]

I understand the leads for the tweeters. Are the other leads some kind of pass through for rear wired mids? 

[RoyC]

That type of front terminal board is typical of the early AR-3.

Larry, the mid leads are disconnected. Two of the terminals, one tweeter and one mid, are connected to a common wire by a single rivet (which is the common (+) yellow wire to the crossover). The other two terminals are connected to the green mid wire and black tweeter wire respectively.

Roy

[stupidhead]

And maybe this will help as well

the black wire Roy refers to is the bottom blob. The mid wires would be front wired and come across the baffle at about 8:00ish. From a different angle from the mid cutout you can see the black wire terminal at the far left.

 

 

[stupidhead]

On ‎3‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 10:18 AM, ra.ra said:

Odd cabinet "upgrades" indeed, but thx for the very good pics. Seems to be no plywood panel on bottoms - - despite the casters, have you inspected the original veneer condition/species on this surface? 

so yeah, the bottoms appear to me to be AR original walnut veneer. my simple observation is that they are in quite good shape but one has a gouge that is visible in this pic, the worst holiday on the set I can find.

and the lines you see are reference lines from the caster installer. Also, I think you asked about the side veneer and it appears to me to also be cabinet grade walnut, but is a thin veneer on a piece of lauan or something.

 

On ‎3‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 10:37 AM, lakecat said:

Well.....that is ONE WAY to keep the plant stains off your veneer!!...lol. Does it look glued on or nailed on? That looks to be a big friggin' mess to deal with. You took excellent pics of the speakers and I never saw that driver connection before either. Certainly a pair that has seen some history for sure.

so on the glued or nailed question, the first edge I worked was the top as the formica top layer was peeling away a tad. After peeling it entirely off this is what we have

so both nailed and glued, likely contact cement. After some mail removal and some judicious prying we have this

which to my eye is walnut veneer and as best I can tell a sheet over the whole surface, not strips butted together. Even though the residual glue/cement is ugly, the surface of the veneer looks very good and I am encouraged. Then some more judicious prying (from the back) reveals the sides

again, the glue is hideous but the veneer surfaces are in very good maybe even immaculate shape. I suspect this work was done very early in the life of these for whatever reason.

So the obvious question is....drum roll.....can these be cleaned up without damaging the veneer? A quick google reveals heating and scraping/chemical solvents/sanding as approaches. I do have toluene and have tried a small corner of one side towards the back and it appears to soften the residue and I believe with a number of hours of effort that these in fact can be brought back. I am a bit dubious of using toluene on the wood surface before getting some sort of confirmation that I am not damaging the wood in any way, or that there might be a better approach?

Thanx for any input.

[ra.ra]

Even with the nasty glue residue, these look better already IMO, probably b/c now the potential for refinishing has been revealed, and I'd agree, the veneer looks to be in good condition. Those little nail holes on the top should be able to be patched pretty well, but the bigger challenge will be trying to conceal the multiple holes left over from the caster screws. 

Far more adept woodworking voices will chime in, but I think my next step in cleaning these up would rely on thin, sharp, blade-like tools: straight edge razor blade, cabinet or paint scraper, chisel, etc., to remove as much hardened gunk as possible, trying to get down to clean wood. Most likely, this might also require a further step of chemical softening with scotch-brite pad and/or some work with hand or power-sanding with mild grit paper. I'm fairly certain that the veneer on the early 3's is robust enough to withstand a full surface power sanding, but of course, proceed with caution and a light touch.    

[JKent]

looks like a couple of major chips on one side but I agree with Robert--the rest may clean up nicely. Soften the gunk if at all possible with a solvent then scrape. Glenn is the master at patching old veneer together like a jigsaw puzzle so look at some of his posts here and on AK. I think the nail holes can probably just be filled, either with wood filler or save the sawdust and mix it with some wood glue to make your own. Problem with sawdust & glue is it may dry darker than the wood. In any case I don't think the nail holes will be "too" noticeable. Great project!

So.... you got the drivers from ligs to finish the 3a's with missing woofers and damaged mid(s). Then he sent you the cabinet he had harvested them from, so now you need more drivers? It's a vicious cycle (but a cool one). You could end up with stacked 3/3a's front and rear in your new living room! Now THAT's what I call SURROUND SOUND!

Keep us posted.

[stupidhead]

2 hours ago, ra.ra said:

Even with the nasty glue residue, these look better already IMO, probably b/c now the potential for refinishing has been revealed, and I'd agree, the veneer looks to be in good condition. Those little nail holes on the top should be able to be patched pretty well, but the bigger challenge will be trying to conceal the multiple holes left over from the caster screws. 

Far more adept woodworking voices will chime in, but I think my next step in cleaning these up would rely on thin, sharp, blade-like tools: straight edge razor blade, cabinet or paint scraper, chisel, etc., to remove as much hardened gunk as possible, trying to get down to clean wood. Most likely, this might also require a further step of chemical softening with scotch-brite pad and/or some work with hand or power-sanding with mild grit paper. I'm fairly certain that the veneer on the early 3's is robust enough to withstand a full surface power sanding, but of course, proceed with caution and a light touch.    

I agree Robert, the only way to know what I am up against is to peel back to original. My sense right from the start was that someone bought these whenever in the early 60's with the intention of doing the shielding with the sides and the added formica topped tabletop top and casters. The woodworker who did the work had done a professional job no doubt. Every edge was perfect. The casters are top quality.

1 hour ago, JKent said:

looks like a couple of major chips on one side but I agree with Robert--the rest may clean up nicely. Soften the gunk if at all possible with a solvent then scrape. Glenn is the master at patching old veneer together like a jigsaw puzzle so look at some of his posts here and on AK. I think the nail holes can probably just be filled, either with wood filler or save the sawdust and mix it with some wood glue to make your own. Problem with sawdust & glue is it may dry darker than the wood. In any case I don't think the nail holes will be "too" noticeable. Great project!

So.... you got the drivers from ligs to finish the 3a's with missing woofers and damaged mid(s). Then he sent you the cabinet he had harvested them from, so now you need more drivers? It's a vicious cycle (but a cool one). You could end up with stacked 3/3a's front and rear in your new living room! Now THAT's what I call SURROUND SOUND!

Keep us posted.

Hi Kent,

The chips you see are in fact some of the backside of the peeled off veneer. Another problem with the photos is you can't see what I see in person. The underlying original veneer shows no evidence of wear and tear before the slathering of the now dried contact cement and over veneer application. I believe you are correct about the nail holes, an inspection inside will be done as well but the nails were not so long as to go through the box.

The ligs part of this story is incredible. Right place right time kind of thing. I am just grateful that we were able to make the connection. I have promised to give them the respect they are due and will see that through. By the way, I just couldn't wait so I took some toluene to the contact cement. I applied with 0000 steel wool but it soon became apparent I did not need the agitation or abrasion of the steel wool. Let the toluene dwell on the cement for a minute or so and it just peels away quite easily.

These cabinets are going to be amazing. This picture represents maybe 45 minutes of effort.

 

 

WOW

 

 

[JKent]

17 minutes ago, stupidhead said:

WOW

what he said

[lakecat]

Nice....you used the right solvent for that glue. Toluene is great for removing glues. For those screw and nail holes, I would use a product from Mohawk. It is epoxy putty sticks they have in walnut. It can be colored with pens to match graining if walnut is off. http://www.mohawk-finishing.com/catalog_browse.asp?ictNbr=113

Glad you got that plywood off with success.....:)

[ra.ra]

3 hours ago, stupidhead said:

I am just grateful.....

Was just listening tonight to the first Dead show I ever attended - - Oakland, June '74.

Great work on those cabinets - - you'll turn those into a pair of beauties in no time.

[stupidhead]

On ‎3‎/‎26‎/‎2017 at 11:58 PM, ra.ra said:

Was just listening tonight to the first Dead show I ever attended - - Oakland, June '74.

Great work on those cabinets - - you'll turn those into a pair of beauties in no time.

Robert, I almost always am listening to some live dead when in the workshop. I am a big fan of the wall of sound year, even though they bailed on the idea it had a unique sound that I always liked.

So they are not perfect but far beyond my expectations. I efforted the rest of the side previously pictured and here is what we end up with. There is a tiny bit of cement left that I will target later but after glue removal a quick RAF wipe and a bit of Howards Feed-n-wax to get an idea of what we have. The top (bottom of the picture) is going to be a different matter. When tearing this apart it seemed as though a different adhering process was used, and sure enough the Toluene doesn't seem to break it down. Almost seems like a liquid nails kind of glue. I will try some heat to hopefully soften and assist in removal. Also the veneer has a few areas where the removal process took away a bit of it here and there. Any thoughts on what might break down this glue?

[lakecat]

I would try lacquer thinner for that glue....or like you said...some heat.

[ra.ra]

7 hours ago, stupidhead said:

I am a big fan of the wall of sound year............. it had a unique sound that I always liked.

I guess I hadn't been fully aware that Owsley's creation lasted for only one tour season, so I guess I should feel even more thrilled that I was able to experience it live at least once. With over 600 speakers (mostly JBL with some E-V) and close to 30,000 watts of McIntosh juice, it really was quite the experience.

Your work on those cabinets is very impressive - - great project, keep it up. 

[JKent]

8 hours ago, stupidhead said:

I am a big fan of the wall of sound year

OK. I'll admit to ignorance. When I hear "wall of sound" I think Phil Spector. Are there commercial albums with the wall of sound or are these bootleg tapes?

-Kent

[stupidhead]