What are these vintage speakers?

Altec Valencia's are a great pair of speakers even by today's standards. 15" woofer and a big sectoral horn. A two way system which was about 100 dB efficient. Huge sound with just low powered amp. It was my frost serious pair of speakers when I bought them back in 1971 at Allied Radio which was bought out eventually by Radio Shack. Still miss those speakers. Wish I still had them to play around with. They certainly aren't very appealing looking so little WAF but boy they sure could sing!

In fact, the receiver pictured with the speakers looks like a Heathkit AR-15. Man, I loved that system. I really miss the days when audio electronics came swathed in walnut or rosewood cabinets. It would be nice for a modern mfgr. to offer real wood cabinets for their gear, I'm betting it would be a very popular option...

-RW-

Wow, that's wild! We had those speakers when I was a kid, they are Heathkit. We had them paired with the Heathkit AR-15 receiver, 50 watts/ch. as I recall. This was a pretty hi-end system back in those daze. Thanks for the rekindled memories!!

-RW-

Al, you are 100% correct. Thanks for taking the time to find the answer. My 1st guess was Altec's. I found photos of Valencia’s which were similar though had visual differences from the speakers in the photo. I would never have thought to add Heathkit into my search parameters. That it took you a quick search I'm betting you had insider information!

They were at a sale I went to today, and I bought them. Amazingly clean especially considering their age. Thanks again Al!!

Tony, yes it seems the owner added the short legs. My take to the purpose was as you mentioned, to reduce the speaker's interaction with the floor.

FWIW, back in the day, it was common for people to add those short legs to speakers. I presume it was to keep from flattening the cartpe or to solve the boominess issue that plagues large speakers sitting directly on the floor.

Found this video which shows the AS-101 in detail:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCX9Ng0sfY8

Regards,
-- Al

Based on a quick Google Images search, they appear to be the Heathkit AS-101, although photos of that model generally show them without legs. The AS-101 apparently used the same Altec drivers that were used in Altec's Valencia model.

Regards,
-- Al