AR 2ax mismatched siblings

[ZedZeroZilch]

Recently acquired this AR 2ax odd couple, which appear to be two different versions. This is my first experience with AR speakers, am new to vintage speaker repairs, and both the speakers have definitely seen better days. But I'm determined to restore them to the best of my ability. I'll post progress photos in this thread for anyone interested.

I plan to at minimum replace the surrounds and recap them. I may go the L-pad route depending on how the pots look.

Just wondering how having mismatched speakers will affect the repair process: Do they require different parts? Are their crossovers different? Any advice is appreciated! (Also if anyone knows their age based on the serial numbers, I'd love to know!)

 

[RxDx]

Looks like the main difference is one mid is missing its screen and
damping. Otherwise I believe they are identical. All the 2ax with
foam woofer surrounds were built after 1970 until being discontinued
in 1976, serial 125000 on. There is indeed a different version, but it
has a cloth surround woofer, up to serial 124999. See linked graph
in my signature.

 

[ZedZeroZilch]

Going to start documenting the repair of these speakers here. Waiting for the new woofer surrounds, but I removed the rest of the old, disintegrating foam and scraped off the sticky residue.
This was the original crossover when I opened up the speaker enclosure (this is the walnut-cased one in my previous post). looks to be original; the other speaker seems to be wired the same. I have no idea who owned these speakers before me or how many, so I'm pleasantly surprised that everything appears to be original.

Cut the wires off the original capacitor box and wired in new caps. A 4 and a 6.2 uF from Parts Express. https://www.parts-express.com/Dayto...-Precision-Audio-Capacitor-027-226?quantity=1

Sometime this week I plan to uninstall the original pots and replace with these L-pads. Am I correct with this comparison between the lpad and original pots:
Pot 1 - > L-Pad 3
Pot B - > L-Pad 2
Pot 2 (Green ground wire) - > L-Pad 1

 

[Stuart Pedaso]

Sometime this week I plan to uninstall the original pots and replace with these L-pads. Am I correct with this comparison between the lpad and original pots:
Pot 1 - > L-Pad 3
Pot B - > L-Pad 2
Pot 2 (Green ground wire) - > L-Pad 1

That appears correct. Circuit would look like this:


Though double-check your L-pad terminals. They should be numbered like this:

 

[ZedZeroZilch]

Gradually making progress. The pots have been replaced with new L-pads and the original caps swapped for new ones in the walnut cased speaker. Resistor soldered to the back of the mid driver.




Hooked it up to my receiver last night and played a record of Mahler's 3rd symphony at low volume (apparently these speakers are best for classical music?). Based on this cursory test, everything seems to be working as it should. The lows, mids, and highs were all present and it had a fairly clear sound. I heard this speaker likes a lot of power to really shine so once the surrounds are on, I'll run it with a bit more juice.

The only issue is the screws for the 1 and 2 speaker wire binding posts come unscrewed and sink into the cabinet when unscrewing the caps to connect the wire. Any tips on keeping them secured?