AVID thread

Just have to chime in again, been through a decent bit of speakers...but my Avid 102's are still used every day in my main listening room.
 
I just Finished restoring a set of 102s I picked up recently. In fact the outer gaskets are drying on the woofers as I type this. Information on the Avid line is somewhat scarce but I have a couple of threads Here and Here that may someday help someone looking for info.

I replaced the tweeters (someone had dropped in realistic tweeters in them) with the originals and changed out the mismatched
7uf caps with new dayton 6.8 film caps from PE.
The only markings on the Fuse in my 102s say they are Buss AGC3 250V
my guess is they were replaced at some point.

I ran into some difficulty locating new surrounds as one of the thread links show. The original surrounds were Butyl Rubber and were split in several locations. I ended up going with a Rubber surround kit from Midwest that is
listed for the JBL 56 118H 10". It was a bit tough to refoam these as the angle of the cone and the style of the rubber surround were not a perfect
fit, so the job wasn't the cleanest refoam Iv'e done. There were some wrinkles in the new surround inner lips that proved tough to get layed down
so I used more glue than I normally would.

Now for the Good ! I have heard a few nice speakers and even have a couple that some would call nice, but very few that I have ever heard
have sweeter mids than these. Despite the amount of time and money I spent to get these back to original condition wich ended up costing roughly
60 bucks plus the original 15 bucks at a GW, I am very pleased with the way they sound, as a matter of fact I still cant believe the mids sound this good considering the are a two way speaker. The tweeters sounded great also.
My final take on these little speakers is they put a smile on me and I got that rare astonishment I get when I hear something I really like. (That doesn't happen often) Some of that may wear off in time as I spend more time listening. But one thing is for sure, these are going to be listened too
alot at my house for some time to come !:thmbsp:

Below are a few pics of the 102s and there are a few more in the links I provided.

New Caps

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New binding post (I hate Spring Clips)

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New tweeters (originals) and new surrounds and dustcaps !

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Hooked them up to the The Rack for a test run with some Sade spinning on the Revox. Right about (NOW) Im starting to smile, Female Vocals are fantastic on these little speakers. They imaged far better than I thought they would. I bet stands would really dial them in. Did I say I was smiling
about now ? :D

IMG_1680.JPG

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Well Im off to find a sweet little integrated to pair up with them so they dont end up sitting in the basement all alone with that big ole rack, getting picked
on by those 200 lb Infinity's.
 
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Very nice! I agree with that the mids/highs are some of the best I've heard. I have my replacement caps and will be completing my 102's next week. These are going to be keepers in my inventory that's for sure.
 
Finally got a chance give the Avids another listen. I hooked them up to a Little
35 watt Hitachi Mini Separates system I picked up from another AK member. I expected them to be a workout for the Little Hitachi (I was wrong) Amazing how well these sound together. They are in a fairly small room at 13 x 16. Iv'e already heard how good Vocals sound on them and the tweeters special also but what I didn't expect is how good the bass is. Low and tight with bass that you can feel. I think iv'e been listening to too many bookshelf speakers lately. I set them on some makeshift stands and tilted them back just a tad and imaging was good with the source and recording I used. I think its time to build some stands for them and try them in one of the bigger systems for a bit.:D Here is a pic of that little Hitachi pushing them without breaking a sweat.

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I love that little Hitachi system - very cool.

Have some Avid 103s around the house still - would consider recapping them, but it's the bass I always though was a bit lean on the speakers, the highs are very good as is.
 
I was playing a workout CD that is very bass heavy (and Intense) and they easily best
any of my speakers except maybe my big QLS1s. Actually I was really surprised by the way they handled this recording. However most of my speakers around the house use
modern 6.5 inch woofers. Also I had them setup in that 10 ft wide alcove section wich could I suppose add to the bass considerably maybe.
 
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Very cool. What model are those? (I have 103's and they look pretty different fro your aside from the woofer.
IMG_9882.jpg

They are 102s and according to another poster they are late models from
around the 21st week of 79 going by the last 4 serial numbers on the woofers. (137 7921)
Of course the woofers could have been replaced but some other threads and pics show them
to be Later 102s. The first 102s Looked like this.
Avid_Model-102_Speakers_collage.jpg
 
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I've got an interesting story/tidbit that has something to do with AVID history.

My father was a bit of Acoustic Research fan back in the 70s and saved up to get himself a pair of AR-11's (Which were apparently the improved successor to the AR-3a) I am fortunate enough to have them in my bedroom back at home, but refuse to bring them to school with me for fear of tearing them up from moving around so much. They are easily the nicest bookshelf speakers I've heard.

Anyways, when he met my mom and told her that he blew all his savings on his stereo (which consisted of a Technics SU-7600, TU-7600, and the AR-11's...she thought he was crazy for spending over $1k on a stereo and could only listen to the radio....which is a story she loves to tell til this day.

After adding an SL-1800 and an Optonica (Mitsubishi) tape deck, I think her opinion was a little changed, and she was soon looking for her own little system.

He tried to sell her on a pair of AR-8's and a Technics tuner/integrated of her own. But not wanting to blow it all on a stereo like he did, she ended up with a pair of Avid 102's and a Technics SA-500 (along with a Bang and Olufsen TT)

Well, from what he tells me...the Avid 102's were apparently pretty much more affordable knock-offs of the AR-8's, and he felt they sounded just as good.

Unfortunately my SX-1250 cooked the woofer on one of them last week :/ so I will either be looking for parts or re-engineering them...but either way...when they're running...they're really quite impressive for 30 year old $300 bookshelf units :)
 
I don't know whether the term "knock-off" is really an accurate representation of the rather incestuous New England speaker buisiness of the 1960s and 1970s :) Lots of cross-pollination (employee, and even principal, movement) between the players, large and small, in and around the Boston area in those days (not unlike the biotech scene in the early-90s in the same general area).

FYI, Optonica was Sharp's "premium" hifi brand name. The Optonica decks were also sold under the Sharp label, and many of Radio Shack's cassette decks in the mid-late 1970s were Sharp OEM as well. Good decks in general, and some were quite good.
 
I am currently reluctantly selling my 102s (look, what can I say... I am blessed with speaker riches and something has to go), but I got to say... my friend's large Advents would go before the 102s. They are such a fine speaker. Too bad they are not well appreciated, probably because they are simply not known. Another speaker like that are Tangents from England (those, I'm keeping) and maybe Castle (although, I'm not sure that works anymore since they've been resurrected).
 
AVID's production numbers were always way less than the 'Big Boys' (KLH/AR/EPI, etc.) of their era.
Out of sight, out of mind ya know...........................................

Steve
 
I just recently saw another set of 102s pop up locally here for practically
the price of dinner for two, even though I dont need them I keep getting the feeling I should go drag them home, The truth is for me they dont really fit into my systems but they sound dang good, this speaker business really is awfully close to being a sickness sometimes, I bet I look at some tomorrow too !:D
 
Heres my 103s..



I just ordered a bunch of capacitors to rebuilt a crossover. I thought the caps died. Twas the fuse :(
 
I just ordered a bunch of capacitors to rebuilt a crossover. I thought the caps died. Twas the fuse :(
Nice stack there. I am debating recapping my 103s... would you mind sharing your parts list? (maybe just a copy/paste of your order invoice payload) It would save me some time to be able to see the cap sizes you ordered when i get around to pulling my crossovers out to check values to set up my order.

(also, let us know when you get them done! :) )
 
Nice stack there. I am debating recapping my 103s... would you mind sharing your parts list? (maybe just a copy/paste of your order invoice payload) It would save me some time to be able to see the cap sizes you ordered when i get around to pulling my crossovers out to check values to set up my order.

(also, let us know when you get them done! :) )

I ordered the parts from Parts-Express. I normally order through Mouser/Newark/Digikey but I had trouble determining if the caps were polarized or not. I bought enough to rebuild a pair of crossovers.



They didnt have exact values on a few of the capacitors. So I planned on hooking some up in parallel.

C1 = 28uF, 40V, Non-Polar [6.8uF 100v + 22uF 100v = 28.8 uF 100v]

C2 = 20uF, 40V, Non-Polar [2 x 10uF 100v = 20 uF 100V]

C3 = 3.5uF, 40V, Non-Polar [3.3uF 100V]

C4 = 4uF, 20V, Non-Polar [4uF 100v]
 
Does anyone have any spec information on the 10" in the Avid 103? One of mine is getting weak. Popping on certain volumes when the others are perfectly fine. I was curious what a suitable replacement might be..
 
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