New Heathkit AS101 owner - First post.

[voice of the theater]

Hello Alan--glad you made it over to our Altec User's Board. Alan had sent me a PM a few days ago at the Lansing Heritage Forum after he read my thread over there about the AS 101's that I used to own (I had threads over there and over here when I owned those speakers). We exchanged a few PM's and I recommended that he visit this forum -- the place to go for all things Altec!

I'm glad you included pics in your thread here Alan, I was wondering if you had the classic "Altec green" drivers or the grey ones that my AS 101's had. I can see yours are green and I'm glad to hear that they're in such nice shape. Besides the new caps, I would definitely clean or replace those 40 year old L Pads. If you decide to clean them, I recommend Deoxit spray. If you want to replace them, Parts express should have something very similar in stock. Cleaning them may be all they need. I liked how my AS 101's sounded with the L Pads "all the way up/full throttle" so I ended up bypassing my L Pads altogether. Between the new caps and bypassing the L Pads, the improvement was impressive. However, cleaning or replacing the L Pads should achieve similar results to bypassing them and by not bypassing them you have more flexibility should you want to adjust them. By the way, I recommend keeping the old caps (and L Pads if you replace them) in a zip lock somewhere. If you ever sell your speakers, there are collectors who really like having the original caps--even if they are leaky and shot!

Here's what my my AS 101's with the grey drivers (8 ohm) looked like:










Another upgrade you might want to try if you want to experiment is to adjust the tuning of the cabinets. AS 101's, like Valencias, were not tuned for really "deep" bass like many later Altecs were (and many other manufacturer's speakers that came along later were--Altec Model 19's, etc.). Those are Altec 416 woofers in your cabs--and they are capable of much deeper bass than you'll get with the stock tuning of those cabs. There are people here who know a lot more about this than I do, but I can tell you that the empirical/scientific method (trial and error method) is a very good way to achieve a "better"/deeper tuning for your cabs. By reducing the port size (blocking off part of the port from the inside of the cab) you can achieve a deeper tuning. You can evaluate your results by listening or by measuring (with a microphone and computer software) combined with listening. For example, you can start by blocking off a small portion of the port by "tacking" a small piece of wood in place to see if you have noticeably improved the bass response, and then blocking off more to see if they sound even better. At a certain point, you'll have blocked off too much of the port and they won't sound right--then you have to go back to a previous tuning/whichever one you liked best and "permanently" block off that portion of the port (use screws to secure the wood you're using to block off part of the port). Properly executed, you can get much deeper bass out of those cabinets than they get with their stock tuning

Personally, I would start with just replacing the caps and cleaning or replacing the L Pads. If you listen to them like that for a while, it will be much easier for you to tell how much of an improvement in bass response has occurred if and when you decide to improve the tuning of the cabs (because by then you'll be very familiar with their bass response with their "factory tuning" using different recordings -- you'll have a good frame of reference).

Down the road, there are other mods you can try. Zilch (who you noticed chimed in with some advice for me in my LH thread), owned Valencias and had suggested as a possible upgrade for Valencias/AS 101's replacing the stock 806 drivers with 802-8g drivers and replacing the stock crossover with Model 19 crossovers or Z19's (his version of the Model 19 crossover). If you ever decide to try this, Great Plains Audio (former Altec employees using authentic vintage Altec designs and tooling) makes brand new 802-8G drivers and brand new Model 19 crossovers or you could buy vintage Altec 802-8G drivers and Altec Model 19 crossovers on ebay. Selling your 806 drivers would give you a decent chunk of change towards 802-8G drivers. However, if you try this upgrade, I recommend keeping the 806's should you ever want to return the speakers to their "stock" configuration (if you want to sell them some day, etc.) This upgrade extends your h.f. response--you end up with speakers that are very similar to Altec Model 19's (416 woofer with the same h.f. driver and crossover that are in Model 19's). In lieu of that, you could add a tweeter to each AS 101, or you may find that after replacing the caps and cleaning the L Pads that they have plenty of sizzle for you and at that point you may or may not want to experiment with cabinet tuning to improve the bass.....

BTW, many Altec speaker systems with the green drivers are 16 ohm systems. Are your AS 101's an 8 ohm system or 16 ohm? That will affect some of the mods I've suggested..... Again, as I mentioned in a PM to you, congrats on buying a great pair of vintage Altec speakers. Also, welcome to the Altec Users Board!