Atlantic Oracle 4
- Thread starter toxcrusadr
- Start date
What is the peerless? I just left the stickers. Never knew what they were for.
They sound great!
Can you still get the original midrange and tweeters anywhere?
Here are the model numbers that toxcrusadr listed for the midrange and tweeter, but it's going to be tough hunting; I'd set up a search for each of these along with "Becker". Do both speakers have the same replacements? If so, you might just keep them as-is.
If they sound good, it's probably that someone knew what they were doing. As opposed to the gorilla who blew the tweeters by overcranking it.
Sold these at a TEAM Electronics Store that I worked at in High School. They were the upper end of the "house brand" Atlantis speakers. Compared with the JBL's, Altecs, Cerwin Vega, etc. speakers that we also sold, these were impressive "looking" but didn't sound all that great. The model 4 that is pictured in this thread was popular with the kids who wanted to "Party", but I didn't think that they sounded very good.
They've impressed some AKers, particularly the model 3, when recapped and driven by a good amp. I'll admit the 4's are a bit boomy with that 15" PR. I would like to try tightening up a pair once I get all of mine going. Either by manipulating the PR (adding weight), cabinet bracing, or crossover mods.
I'm restoring a pair of Oracle IV that are missing the smoked glass tops. Went to my local glass store and they had two grades of tinted glass: one that's as dark as the original, and a lighter one they call 'gray' which is still pretty dark but you would be able to see through it a bit. Thing is, the dark glass is very expensive. The gray glass was about $20 each cut to size, and the guy said that the dark glass would be more like $80 ! I don't know what kind of fairy dust they use to get the dark tint but it must be expensive. I went with the lighter stuff.
Gotta wonder if that glass was a lot cheaper in the 70s or what. Seems like it would have been a good chunk of the cost of the speakers, at today's prices.
Edit: Looked around a bit since the topic piqued my interest as a chemist, but glass is such a huge industry and there are so many products that it was not easy to tell what they use for dark/black glass.
Gotta wonder if that glass was a lot cheaper in the 70s or what. Seems like it would have been a good chunk of the cost of the speakers, at today's prices.
Edit: Looked around a bit since the topic piqued my interest as a chemist, but glass is such a huge industry and there are so many products that it was not easy to tell what they use for dark/black glass.
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71CNY
Active Member
With mine I had one piece of glass.When I went to look for glass I too was put off by cost. I ended up putting plain old clear glass in. I rather like the look as you can get a nice view of the crossover and drivers.
My wife loves the look of them and said I can't get rid of them. She also stated they are going in her sewing room.
My wife loves the look of them and said I can't get rid of them. She also stated they are going in her sewing room.
Someone suggested the film used for tinting auto glass windows, applied to the underside of clear glass. Brilliant idea.
I have to report on the Epic Atlantic Oracle Triple Stack since I've hinted at it for a long time. The inspiration for this insanity was that the upper drivers were in a line, and if stacked laying on their sides, the Oracles would make a kind of poor man's line array. The driver spacing would be wonky so it might not sound that good, but where else in the universe would 3 pairs of these fairly rare speakers ever be found in one place ever again? I felt compelled to do it for history and for Science. 
In case you're wondering how in the heck (or why) I got 3 pairs of these: the original pair of IV's were free needing refoaming, and the other two came from an AKer in Omaha who had picked them up somewhere intending to restore them and just wasn't getting around to it. There are more of them around the KS-MO-NE-IA-WI-MN area because that's the Team Electronics region.
I finally got my 2 pairs of IV's and the pair of III's going all at once. I had a 3+4 combo playing in my basement last winter, but that room is so bad sonically that everything sounds crappy in it so it was hard to tell.
Tyella and I hauled all 6 speakers (total about 330 lb, thanks man!) to Kansas City for an AK gathering at Kurtgo's. (thread here: http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/kc-area-ak-get-together-june-2.821331/) . I made some 2x4 bases to get them off the floor about a foot, figuring that would put the vertical driver array centered on a seated listener's head. We set them up in the garage since I had the single pair of III's going in there last fall and we all liked the sound. All powered by borrowed amps and preamps - Parasound, Yamaha, Proton and a 300W digital amp from Kurt were rotated in and out, each stereo pair on its own amp.
It looks impressive but honestly it did not sound that good. To me it was bass shy and too midrange-y. It was not hard to figure out why. When you have one pair sitting on the floor, the woofers are close to the floor and of course that leads to some bass enhancement. The speaker is voiced with that orientation. Now the bottom pair may be close to 'normal' here, but the upper ones are getting virtually no boundary enhancement. But the mids and tweeters are playing at their same levels. So right away the whole thing is out of balance. And that's not even counting the comb filtering that may happen because of driver spacing.
If you sat in the sweet spot, it sounded OK, and there was a kind of spacious quality to the sound. 25 feet farther back in the driveway, it was not too bad either. If one was to multi-amp these speakers, so the levels of mids and tweets could be adjusted individually, the results could probably be improved.
At some point one of the 10" woofers on the center pair of IV's that was recently refoamed started to have voice coil rub. I had played them for several hours at moderate volume at home earlier that week to make sure everything was OK and had no rubbing (although that was done upright). It was not cranked up that high - honestly this stack should be capable of ear-bleeding volume considering what a single pair can do, and we did not have it anywhere close to that. But suddenly it started rubbing so we shut down the middle pair.
This led to bringing down the III's from the top and setting them up normally.
They sounded every bit as good in Kurt's garage as I remembered from last fall.
Now that that's out of my system, I will give a salute to Zilch (rest is soul) who always said that stacking is a bad idea, and explained why with facts, figures and graphs. Some people seem to like some speakers stacked, so there are exceptions, and that's why I bothered to try in the first place. Bottom line, the Oracles sound darn good on their own.
And now I have one or maybe two pairs more than I really need.
In case you're wondering how in the heck (or why) I got 3 pairs of these: the original pair of IV's were free needing refoaming, and the other two came from an AKer in Omaha who had picked them up somewhere intending to restore them and just wasn't getting around to it. There are more of them around the KS-MO-NE-IA-WI-MN area because that's the Team Electronics region.
I finally got my 2 pairs of IV's and the pair of III's going all at once. I had a 3+4 combo playing in my basement last winter, but that room is so bad sonically that everything sounds crappy in it so it was hard to tell.
Tyella and I hauled all 6 speakers (total about 330 lb, thanks man!) to Kansas City for an AK gathering at Kurtgo's. (thread here: http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/kc-area-ak-get-together-june-2.821331/) . I made some 2x4 bases to get them off the floor about a foot, figuring that would put the vertical driver array centered on a seated listener's head. We set them up in the garage since I had the single pair of III's going in there last fall and we all liked the sound. All powered by borrowed amps and preamps - Parasound, Yamaha, Proton and a 300W digital amp from Kurt were rotated in and out, each stereo pair on its own amp.
It looks impressive but honestly it did not sound that good. To me it was bass shy and too midrange-y. It was not hard to figure out why. When you have one pair sitting on the floor, the woofers are close to the floor and of course that leads to some bass enhancement. The speaker is voiced with that orientation. Now the bottom pair may be close to 'normal' here, but the upper ones are getting virtually no boundary enhancement. But the mids and tweeters are playing at their same levels. So right away the whole thing is out of balance. And that's not even counting the comb filtering that may happen because of driver spacing.
If you sat in the sweet spot, it sounded OK, and there was a kind of spacious quality to the sound. 25 feet farther back in the driveway, it was not too bad either. If one was to multi-amp these speakers, so the levels of mids and tweets could be adjusted individually, the results could probably be improved.
At some point one of the 10" woofers on the center pair of IV's that was recently refoamed started to have voice coil rub. I had played them for several hours at moderate volume at home earlier that week to make sure everything was OK and had no rubbing (although that was done upright). It was not cranked up that high - honestly this stack should be capable of ear-bleeding volume considering what a single pair can do, and we did not have it anywhere close to that. But suddenly it started rubbing so we shut down the middle pair.
This led to bringing down the III's from the top and setting them up normally.
They sounded every bit as good in Kurt's garage as I remembered from last fall.
Now that that's out of my system, I will give a salute to Zilch (rest is soul) who always said that stacking is a bad idea, and explained why with facts, figures and graphs. Some people seem to like some speakers stacked, so there are exceptions, and that's why I bothered to try in the first place. Bottom line, the Oracles sound darn good on their own.
And now I have one or maybe two pairs more than I really need.
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Those 3s sounded pretty darn sweet on their own! I liked the sound of the big stack out in the driveway, too. The stack might have sounded different if we'd cranked all those amps and "opened 'er up" a little more.
I had another thought. We could watch Apocolypse Now or the Avengers on the side of a barn with these bad boys as the surround speakers.
I had another thought. We could watch Apocolypse Now or the Avengers on the side of a barn with these bad boys as the surround speakers.
frankiebull
Active Member
frankiebull
Active Member
Thanks, that narrows it down.
moebuster
Super Member
you'd be surprised at what a generac surround will fit.
obviously these are not common speakers and a few measurements will narrow things down further.
i havent looked but i dont think you'll find a seller that list your particular speaker model and if you do they tend to sell replacements all from the same pile.
one size fits all.
there may be some trial and error.
if it were me i'd gamble on the cheapies and that way IF they dont fit im not out 50 bucks or so.
obviously these are not common speakers and a few measurements will narrow things down further.
i havent looked but i dont think you'll find a seller that list your particular speaker model and if you do they tend to sell replacements all from the same pile.
one size fits all.
there may be some trial and error.
if it were me i'd gamble on the cheapies and that way IF they dont fit im not out 50 bucks or so.