The venerable 2-way speaker from Acoustic Research. If you like and collect vintage speakers, people say the AR4x are special set of speakers. However, they all suffer from some sort of corroded rheostats for the tweeters.
Disassembly was dirty, had to be done outside. The fiber glass filling is nasty stuff, gloves and mask are needed. Once inside, I've noticed this "brick" underneath the choke, it was a wax capacitor and huge for 20uf by today standard. Pulled the rheostats, took it apart to remove the corrosion and lubricate it before reassembly, put a new capacitor inside and put everything back together. On the walnut veneer I did a light oiling. So, these have been completely refurbished.
So how do they sound? Well, over the years I've heard and had many speakers, including some bigger ARs. They clearly have the sound signature of that era, definitely not as forward sounding to more modern speakers but, they definitely have more "fuller" signature in comparison to modern bookshelf speakers. In lack of better words, they're nice sounding. I know that sounds very generic but, it's hard to find fault in a speaker this old. It has that typical East Coast sound, it's nice, detailed, good soundstage, laid back in presentation and quite smooth.
They are a great pair of speakers for what they are. And. that is exactly their flaw, they have a bit of treble roll off (a lot of vintage speakers suffer from a bit of treble roll off). Many will not care but, for some it might be an issue. Clearly, the AR4x are not using the latest ribbon/diamond technology.
However, they are a testament of the quality of sound from that era that many people love. Even by today's standard they are still an excellent sounding pair of speakers.
Serial Numbers are:
FX207137
FX207126
Disassembly was dirty, had to be done outside. The fiber glass filling is nasty stuff, gloves and mask are needed. Once inside, I've noticed this "brick" underneath the choke, it was a wax capacitor and huge for 20uf by today standard. Pulled the rheostats, took it apart to remove the corrosion and lubricate it before reassembly, put a new capacitor inside and put everything back together. On the walnut veneer I did a light oiling. So, these have been completely refurbished.
So how do they sound? Well, over the years I've heard and had many speakers, including some bigger ARs. They clearly have the sound signature of that era, definitely not as forward sounding to more modern speakers but, they definitely have more "fuller" signature in comparison to modern bookshelf speakers. In lack of better words, they're nice sounding. I know that sounds very generic but, it's hard to find fault in a speaker this old. It has that typical East Coast sound, it's nice, detailed, good soundstage, laid back in presentation and quite smooth.
They are a great pair of speakers for what they are. And. that is exactly their flaw, they have a bit of treble roll off (a lot of vintage speakers suffer from a bit of treble roll off). Many will not care but, for some it might be an issue. Clearly, the AR4x are not using the latest ribbon/diamond technology.
However, they are a testament of the quality of sound from that era that many people love. Even by today's standard they are still an excellent sounding pair of speakers.
Serial Numbers are:
FX207137
FX207126