Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......

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Wayner

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #80 on: 23 Jan 2012, 05:31 pm »
I certainly didn't need another pair of speakers, call me an "audio historian", or whatever else you want to (good or bad). When you grow up with this stuff, like dbcooper and others, there is an attachment, that can't be explained. I almost get teary eyed when I think about the old days.

When I was a teen, I decided to build a Dynaco PAT-4 and Stereo 120 amp, spending every night after skool soldering and assembling. I also had enough to spend on a pair of AR-2ax's.

When I had finished the Dynacos, the ARs had arrived (by train), I remember the day like it was yesterday. We went to the Willmar train depot and picked them up. When we got them home, I quickly hooked them up. Now remember, the Dynacos were freshly assembled, but not tested. Well, I turned the system on, and a big puff of smoke came out of the amp. Silence fell into the room. I was mortally wounded.

So, after I gathered my cool, I decided I must have surely wired something wrong in the amp, the preamp worked, at least with headphones. So off it went to Jensen's stereo shop, in Burnsville. Little did I know that  there would be a connection with a certain individual, nor did I know that we would meet again in different circumstances.

Well, the amp came back. I hooked it all up again, and still one speaker did not play. I switch the speakers around, and then suddenly I realized that the same speaker on the same channel that got smoked, also got fried. I was once again mortified.

So, after a call to AR, the speaker got loaded back into the car, back to Willmar and back on the train. 2 and 1/2 fricken, agonizing months goes buy, and a note comes from the Willmar depot that they had a large package for me.

Finally, and end to the shaky beginning.

I remember listening to some music that night in my bedroom. I had Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's Deja Vu playing. My dad, actually came into the room and sat on my bed next to me and listened to a couple of songs. He said "pretty nice" and left the room. That was the only time that ever happened.

There is the AR story.

Wayner

martyo

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #81 on: 23 Jan 2012, 05:38 pm »
Great story, thanks for sharing it with us. 8)

Quiet Earth

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #82 on: 23 Jan 2012, 06:32 pm »
Good times Wayner, good times!  :thumb:

Wayner's Audio Museum
Open Tuesday thru Saturday 10am - 6pm
Closed on Christmas Day

Delta Wave

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #83 on: 23 Jan 2012, 06:44 pm »
Excellent!  :thumb:

Æ

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #84 on: 23 Jan 2012, 09:34 pm »
BTW the upper bass depression you talk about was specifically addressed by Allison in their designs 35 years ago (I thought frequency response anomalies are not the same thing as distortion, but WTF do I know, apparently not much)

Yes, I'm fairly familiar with the Allison placement techniques, methodology. I may have an article or two tucked away somewhere. I still have his/the original "Best Place" software on floppy diskette. If I remember correctly it was designed to run on Windows 3.11, not that I'll ever be using DOS/Windows 3.11 again. I think the last time I actually used the software was with Windows 98.

Zaph has a massive collection of distortion measurements. If you see any Acoustic Suspension woofers at his website, let me know and I can compare distortion specs. I'm not equipped to measure distortion, I have no need to invest in that sort of equipment.
I suppose one could dig up some old magazine reviews.

BSC=Baffle Step Correction. It is discussed here at AudioCircle. Has nothing to do with distortion per se, but as you drive any woofer harder and harder the distortion rises regardless of the type of woofer be it Acoustic Suspension or Bass Reflex. A bass reflex woofer has the distinct advantage of having to move less, only because the port is a major bass contributor too. Of course ports do have their limitations.

Mitsuman

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #85 on: 23 Jan 2012, 09:53 pm »
I certainly didn't need another pair of speakers, call me an "audio historian", or whatever else you want to (good or bad). When you grow up with this stuff, like dbcooper and others, there is an attachment, that can't be explained. I almost get teary eyed when I think about the old days.

When I was a teen, I decided to build a Dynaco PAT-4 and Stereo 120 amp, spending every night after skool soldering and assembling. I also had enough to spend on a pair of AR-2ax's.

When I had finished the Dynacos, the ARs had arrived (by train), I remember the day like it was yesterday. We went to the Willmar train depot and picked them up. When we got them home, I quickly hooked them up. Now remember, the Dynacos were freshly assembled, but not tested. Well, I turned the system on, and a big puff of smoke came out of the amp. Silence fell into the room. I was mortally wounded.

So, after I gathered my cool, I decided I must have surely wired something wrong in the amp, the preamp worked, at least with headphones. So off it went to Jensen's stereo shop, in Burnsville. Little did I know that  there would be a connection with a certain individual, nor did I know that we would meet again in different circumstances.

Well, the amp came back. I hooked it all up again, and still one speaker did not play. I switch the speakers around, and then suddenly I realized that the same speaker on the same channel that got smoked, also got fried. I was once again mortified.

So, after a call to AR, the speaker got loaded back into the car, back to Willmar and back on the train. 2 and 1/2 fricken, agonizing months goes buy, and a note comes from the Willmar depot that they had a large package for me.

Finally, and end to the shaky beginning.

I remember listening to some music that night in my bedroom. I had Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's Deja Vu playing. My dad, actually came into the room and sat on my bed next to me and listened to a couple of songs. He said "pretty nice" and left the room. That was the only time that ever happened.

There is the AR story.

Wayner

Wayner, I'm probably mis-speaking here but I share your passion for vintage gear and my impression is that nostalgia is probably lost on the newer generation. I see it in posts I read here, and in the obsession today with instant gratification and the idea that everything is disposable. I just wonder if 30 years from now, there will be a rabid group here that is restoring gear being produced today.  :scratch:

Great post and here's to you. :beer:

Wayner

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #86 on: 23 Jan 2012, 10:21 pm »
Mitsuman, I don't know what future generations will do. Perhaps, someday when I'm gone, someone will simply throw my ARs into the dumpster, along with my records and turntables. How do you you go about restoring an Ipod?

I don't know about you guys, but audio (and music) is my whole life. Perhaps that means I'm a really shallow person, getting lost on the audiophool highway.

I do occasionally remember the reason I have equipment. It's to listen to the music. While humans are busy being crappy to each other, they can some how paint a different picture with music. It's one of the few nice things we can do to (or for) each other, bridging religion, race, or political points of view.

Even if we occasionally argue in these silly blogs, we all have a common thread, and that thread is the musica.

Wayner

WGH

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #87 on: 24 Jan 2012, 12:53 am »
I just wonder if 30 years from now, there will be a rabid group here that is restoring gear being produced today.

But of course there will be. I'll still be here extolling the virtues of my "ancient" Salk HT2-TL's. My JBL L100's are 40 years old and still sound great, wonder what the young whippersnappers will think as I blast rock and roll through 70 year old speakers? (At 93 I'll be half deaf of course and will have to blast the music just to hear it.)

Wayne 

Delta Wave

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #88 on: 24 Jan 2012, 11:52 am »
Mitsuman, I don't know what future generations will do. Perhaps, someday when I'm gone, someone will simply throw my ARs into the dumpster, along with my records and turntables. How do you you go about restoring an Ipod?

I don't know about you guys, but audio (and music) is my whole life. Perhaps that means I'm a really shallow person, getting lost on the audiophool highway.

I do occasionally remember the reason I have equipment. It's to listen to the music. While humans are busy being crappy to each other, they can some how paint a different picture with music. It's one of the few nice things we can do to (or for) each other, bridging religion, race, or political points of view.

Even if we occasionally argue in these silly blogs, we all have a common thread, and that thread is the musica.

Wayner

 :thumb:

rcag_ils

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #89 on: 10 Feb 2012, 01:27 am »
Wayne, what year did your AR story happen?

Russell Dawkins

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #90 on: 10 Feb 2012, 01:45 am »
In my estimation, the AR-2ax was the prototype of the modern 3 way speaker.

I would have bought a pair if I could have afforded them at the time, but the AR-4xs which I bought instead started my father on his hi-fi trip - which culminated in a pair of Clements RT7s.

I'll never forget coming home one night soon after, shortly after he bought a pair of Koss Pro4As, to find him marveling (via headphones) at Jimi Hendrix's "Gypsy Eyes", surrounded by a veritable fog of a certain kind of smoke and grinning ear to ear. This would be 1972 and he was 60.

Æ

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #91 on: 10 Feb 2012, 03:13 am »
I'll never forget coming home one night soon after, shortly after he bought a pair of Koss Pro4As, to find him marveling (via headphones) at Jimi Hendrix's "Gypsy Eyes", surrounded by a veritable fog of a certain kind of smoke and grinning ear to ear. This would be 1972 and he was 60.

Wonderful story.

Wayner

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #92 on: 10 Feb 2012, 01:01 pm »
Wayne, what year did your AR story happen?

I think it was 1971 or 1972.....

rcag_ils

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #93 on: 10 Feb 2012, 04:36 pm »
I am wondering what Burnsville and the Jensen Stereo Shop was like back then, I don't suppose you took any picture. I have a Dyna FM-5 built by the Jensen Stereo Shop, it might have been from that era.

Wayner

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #94 on: 10 Feb 2012, 05:14 pm »
It was the nearest repair center for Dynaco at the time, so that is where it ended up.

Wayner

avahifi

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #95 on: 11 Feb 2012, 12:55 am »
Jensens Stereo Shop way back then was not all that much different that Audio by Van Alstine today.  Today however, we have many years more experience and a lot more skilled and motivated electrical engineering talent, and with the same kind of small group of dedicated audio purists producing the highest quality equipment we can do. Its still fun!

Wayner is a big part of our clan here now, doing all the metal design work and more, including the Longhorn phono cartridges.  What he designs always fits perfectly. That is a far cry from the Dyna metal parts of old, which required the use of two crowbars and a metal file to fit the pieces together, assuming that the sheet metal screws did not strip out.

By the way, my first stereo system consisted of a Dual 1009 turntable, Grado cartridge, Dyna FM-3 tuner, Dyna PAS-3 preamp (I waited on this until they lost the brown plastic knobs and painted brass faceplate), two Dyna MK IV amplifiers (mono versions of the ST-70) and a pair of KLH 6 loudspeakers.  It was pretty darn good for those days.  It replaced my mono system; Heathkit 7 watt tube integrated amp, Garrard Model T turntable, Grado cartridge, and a Electro-voice 8" dual cone speaker in their Baronet folded horn cabinet (all built myself when I was in 7th grade.

Those were the days!

Regards,

Frank Van Alstine

rcag_ils

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #96 on: 11 Feb 2012, 02:55 am »
Thanks for the history Frank. I was in junior high school in Roseville taking electronic. Learned how to read the resistor color band, cap and coil, how to use soldering iron, flux and all. I built a fish caller that didn't work, a handshake shocker, basically a step up transformer, and a police siren, that was kind of cool. There's where I took my first soldering class.

I didn't get into hifi until a little later.

Wayner

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #97 on: 11 Feb 2012, 01:01 pm »
Bad Boys Rape Our Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly...........
(black, brown, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, gray and white) as I recall....

The resistor color code, put to (perhaps poor taste) poetry. I certainly didn't come up with it, this is what they taught us in school....

 :D

Æ

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Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #98 on: 11 Feb 2012, 06:26 pm »
Bad Boys Rape Our Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly...........
(black, brown, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, gray and white) as I recall....

The resistor color code, put to (perhaps poor taste) poetry. I certainly didn't come up with it, this is what they taught us in school....

 :D

It's just another helpful mnemonic for remembering something. But I found an even better way. :lol:




wvabbit

Re: Picked up a pair of AR-4X speakers today.......
« Reply #99 on: 28 Feb 2012, 01:08 am »
I still think those aren't L-pads, but then again maybe I'm wrong. Anyway, if you do the math then 20uF at 15 ohms is 795Hz! Basically you'd be high passing the tweeter at 800Hz and you'd still have some music power for at least two octaves below 800Hz.

Why not just wire them up properly with a modern 8 ohm L-pad and some high quality film capacitors? 20uf at 8 ohms would be ~1000Hz!
You are correct, they are rehostats sometimes called potentiometers not L pads.