What is this?

ok finally got the Fisher flipped over. see the better pictures. now, i'm trying to date the unit. it looks to have the Ampex 960 in it, if that helps. the good thing, the drawers that were in the bottom of the speaker cabinet, were not screwed into anything, they popped out. the bad, I have to cut to 15" rounds to fill the "downfiring" holes.

all in all, a fun winter project.
 

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The 960 was a 1958-59 model. Pull it out of the hole and look at the motor. It'll have a complete date on it. Then figure 2-3 months logistics time to assemble the complete unit.
 
You're planning to fit some sort of bookshelf speaker into the original holes vs re-creating the original speaker layout I take it?

Nothing wrong with running a pair of Mark III's for power amps. You could do a whole lot worse, and unless you tell someone its Dynaco powered they wouldn't know. You could probably run something lower powered without any issue if you wanted, an ST-70 behind the scenes would be fine.
 
ok finally got the Fisher flipped over. see the better pictures. now, i'm trying to date the unit. it looks to have the Ampex 960 in it, if that helps. the good thing, the drawers that were in the bottom of the speaker cabinet, were not screwed into anything, they popped out. the bad, I have to cut to 15" rounds to fill the "downfiring" holes.

all in all, a fun winter project.

wouldn't a 16" square just cover and seal it from the inside? What is your plan for the speaker enclosures?
 
You're planning to fit some sort of bookshelf speaker into the original holes vs re-creating the original speaker layout I take it?

Nothing wrong with running a pair of Mark III's for power amps. You could do a whole lot worse, and unless you tell someone its Dynaco powered they wouldn't know. You could probably run something lower powered without any issue if you wanted, an ST-70 behind the scenes would be fine.


Oh No, it's getting put back to stock. A couple of Jensen P15R's are in order.

I will have to make (2) new front grilles for it.
 
not sure I understand blocking the bottom openings off if you're putting drivers back in. Unless the bottom hole is not stock?
 
Bottom holes are not stock
I did not know that those hole weren't original factory... now I get it... and I think that Larry's suggestion to just cut some 1/2" ply for the entire bottom and then seal the edges is a good one... verses plugged holes.

Are you sure you don't want to put some 15" subs in there and rattle the house? :p
 
I did not know that those hole weren't original factory... now I get it... and I think that Larry's suggestion to just cut some 1/2" ply for the entire bottom and then seal the edges is a good one... verses plugged holes.

Are you sure you don't want to put some 15" subs in there and rattle the house? :p


Pretty tempting
 
Before you close up the holes (which look factory stock to me with the cloth), dry fit the 15" woofer, 8" mid and 2- 5" Tweeters on the front panel. If they don't all fit, you might want to consider placing the woofers on the deck. I'll check with TheRed1 on this but I'm about 99% sure at least one of these years had down firing woofers.
 
The problem with down firing woofers is the weight of the cone moves it off center. This reduces the maximum excursion in the down direction. There would also be a slight difference in force required to move the cone up vs. down which would, at least in theory, distort the sound. There was some discussion on another AK thread about this issue related to Empire downward firing speakers.
 
I'm still digging but the 1957 and 1958 PRESIDENT also used the same basic cabinet. No spec's on the 57 yet as I'm still looking but the 58 used the following chassis.
Chassis: AM-80, FM-80, 80-PRT, 80-A(Z)

38 Tubes/60 Watts


Due to the totally open front area (no fascia board) we can't tell what gear went into this particular cabinet. I'm still looking.

1957President-1.jpg
 
The bottom holes are not stock, I thought they might be at first as well. If you look carefully the cloth is wrinkly and puckered, Fisher didn't do that. Also the drawers and speaker cloth are not original. The console had a plywood speaker board in the front covered in cane that is missing. It will be easy enough to recreate and Tracy can use mine as a factory reference. Tracy's plan to fill the holes in with like thickness plywood will work perfectly. Cut, fit, glue, then fill in the gap and sand smooth. I had to do that exact repair on a Magnavox Concert Grand I restored a few years ago.
 
The RC-88 and A-70 Garrards are somewhat difficult to deal with, but one item that is often overlooked is the record size sensing arm. The lubrication on its shaft is often overlooked and will cause the autochange cycle to not operate correctly, and the arm will come down on the wrong area of a record. There are indeed plenty of spots within the mechanism to develop dried out lubrication. Personally I like the Garrards but the Elac and Dual changers are also nice and some of the later versions can deal with very low tracking force cartridge/stylus combinations and have added anti-skating measures as well. I just finished an Elac for my granddaughter's stereo and it works flawlessly.

Joe
 
The problem with down firing woofers is the weight of the cone moves it off center. This reduces the maximum excursion in the down direction. There would also be a slight difference in force required to move the cone up vs. down which would, at least in theory, distort the sound. There was some discussion on another AK thread about this issue related to Empire downward firing speakers.

I think in this instance we are less concerned about the physics and quality of downfiring woofs... its about a restoration... But Zarek has helped clear this up.
 
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