Oft-Forgotten Mach III's

dorsett33

dorsett33

Active Member
I truly enjoy reading the VL Mach I thread as well as other spin-off threads such as RSSteve's Mach 4 Rhino's etc. These threads led me to stock pile some Realistic speakers...and I love all of them. I took Copa's advice on the Mach II by replacing the mid-range with the 40-1281 soft dome mid, completed the VL mods on a pair of my Mach I's. Now Im listening to my Mach III's hooked up to a Pioneer SX 750 and I really like the sound of these oft-forgotten speakers.

Have there been any studies with regards to mods for the Mach III's?

Lets bring these back to life just like we did the Mach I's and to a small extent the Mach II's!!
 
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Can you post some pics of the mids & tweeters? It would be interesting to see how they compare to the drivers in the Mach Ones. Looking at a pic of the top of the crossover posted a few years back, it "looks" like the crossover points are similar to the Mach Two's. Three separate freq bands, not with the tweeter & mid overlapping like the Mach Ones. Could you post a pic of the bottom of the crossover board?
Not knowing how low the mid horn can crossover, I'd just re-cap with poly's on the mids. The tweeters look to have mylar caps on them so they should be OK. On the woofer, I'd try raising the woofer crossover point like VL did on the Mach-One Tier-One mod. You'd have to compare the construction of the mids to the mids on the Mach-Ones to see if they need to be "worked on" in a similar fashion. Of course adding damping material to the horns wouldn't hurt either.

What say you dorsett33, ready to bring a little glory to the Mach III's?
 
I always wanted to hear the 3's, curious about how the mid differs from the 1's and if they are better. Sure don't see many Mach 3's around my parts.
 
RickeyM said:
It gets better. There are two versions of it.
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I've read, here on AK about the two versions. There was a thread on this subject. I have a feeling that the Mach Three was too late in the game. When Surround took off, around 84 or 85, and sub woofers were coming into there own, the need for large footprint hogging speakers was doomed. This is not to say there weren't those of us who didn't appreciate these speakers, and I have only 4 pairs of Mach Monsters, the general public at large was buying into the smaller is better theme. I doubt that Tandy was pushing the Mach Three, 4000 and 5000 speakers like their predecessors. I have only seen one pair myself and don't read many posts about them, so the numbers appear to be rather limited.

If I could ever get my hands on a set, not only would I have the three generations, but I would be able to get T/S specs to post.
 
I have a pair of mach 3's that have been to war and back. I got em for free off the local CL and they needed refoamed... oh yeah and the crossover was disconnected from everything in one of them and rattling in the bottom of the cab along with an inductor that I inferred where to put back. Also weird was that the 1/4" jack on the back was wired to the crossover but the push button receiver thingamabobs were not... so I switched that around. Although, that was worthless because they don't want to hold onto anything. I fired em up and boom, wasn't expecting to be hit with such nice sound. I was using a pioneer sx 650 and a mitsubishi dr15 (I think that's the one) with them in the garage with pretty pleasing results. Also, while I had them open I added a brace or two. The cabs are horrendous on mine and the grilles are wrecked. But they're kings of the garage for now... having displaced several sansui models.
 
What say you dorsett33, ready to bring a little glory to the Mach III's?
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I'm going to take a few pictures and get them up here tomorrow. Lets bring these babies out of the closet and into the forefront. They should hopefully have all the engineering and design of the Mach I and II and then some. Im telling you....they sound great!
 
Here's a few pics to give you an idea....
 

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dorsett33 said:
Here's a few pics to give you an idea....
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T series in the back ground there, but not exactly sure which. I've got 110 and 120, but would like a pair of 200 or 300. Interesting the similarities with the Mach Two. I believe the difference in the woofers was Korea. All the Mach's prior to that were made in Japan, or at least the drivers were. They're likely the same spec as the Two's since they seem to go just as deep. Interesting changes over the many generations of Mach speakers.
 
RS Steve said:
I would love to see pictures of the drivers and crossovers, always been interested to see what they look like. If you get them apart be sure to share with some pictures. :yes:
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I might take them apart and post a few pictures this weekend so that we can discuss possible mods/improvements to this line of Mach's. Stay tuned....
 
dorsett33 said:
I might take them apart and post a few pictures this weekend so that we can discuss possible mods/improvements to this line of Mach's. Stay tuned....
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Very high probability updated caps will make the largest improvement. RS did good with drivers, OK with cabinets and skimped by with networks, mostly cheaper parts. Many people who have capped RS speakers (from the 60's to the 80's) have noticed improvements. But when someone like VL comes along and puts the kind of effort in to really bring out the best, it's just mind-blowing. I only hope we're up to the task. Could be a fun and rewarding journey.
 
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