Info needed on ARB amps

[JJTj]

Hey folks:

They were made in the 70's, most know as those blue
flocked 2-15/4-horn PA cabs (they did make amps) in
Frank Zappa's movie 200 Motels. ANY help would be great.

Thanks big time in advance.

JJTj

[Enzo]

Oh dear lord. Our band had an ARB PA system, back in the late 1960s early 1970s. Four flocked reflex PA horns - like in a train station - for highs and a couple 12" woofers. (I remember them as 12s, they could have been 15s) Not really very good sounding boxes. The PA mixer was a roll around unit. Had a prety basic mixer on the sloping top. Bass, treble, volume for each channel and a master volume. There were two power amps, identical units of roughly rack size as I recall. The mixer had a cable that plugged into the amps. I think they were 100 watts each. We blew up an amp from time to time. I think it was intended one amp per speaker, but I think we used one amp for the PA and one for monitor speakers.

I don't remember much about the amp specifically, other than we could pull the mixer out of the roller cab and sit it on a table or bar top. And the power amps could be pulled out as well. I don't recall them being too complex.

I just remember that I got out of it about as much as was possible, but we still looked at the guys with Shure Vocal Master PAs with envy.

What info do you need? Repair? Performance?

Yours is the first mention of ARB anything I have seen in decades, and when I have searched for them on google I found about nothing.

[JJTj]

I have two of those cabs (yes, they are 15" SROs) but I am trying to finish
a book on obscure amps, and boy-howdy, does this fit in. ANY info ANYONE
has will be helpfull. I went thru all my paper, boxes and boxes and boxes of
stuff, but nothing. This next week, I'm going thru all that paper and will
list what I have if anyone needs any info, I'll post it asap. Thanx folks.

JJTj

[ChMo']

I know this thread is old, but I just now stumbled in, and have some memory of these.
A few friends and I knew a one of Zappa's road crew in the 70's, and occasionally borrowed a few of those ARB cabs. They each had 2 EV SRO 15's and 4 re-entrant type paging horns (probably University or Atlas, or a knock-off of those) and the cab itself was a shallow simplified folded horn - front outward facing woofers with a small-ish folded horn path loading the rear of the woofer. Some other variations - same cab without the re-entrant horns for bass and keyboard instruments, and a half-as-wide single 15 cab either with or without 2 horns.

Unfortunately I don't have any Lit, but I do have a clear memory of their dimensions, from measuring them to fit in a van. In round numbers the single 15 cabs were 36"H X 18"W X 18"D and the dual 15 cabs were 36"H X 36"W X 18"D. The folded bass horn path was in concept kind of like a very simplified version of a JBL 4530, except smaller shallower and no curves. Cabinet construction was fair to middling at best, 3/4 ply but not much bracing with flimsy casters and metal corners that usually broke and fell off.

Basically they worked decent for bass and keyboards because of the EV SRO 15s, for which they really worked better with the re-entrant horns disconnected or removed, and actually had a nice resonance for jazz guitar. They sounded more impressive when Zappa used them, probably because he had many of them stacked double high, which creates a large area sound wall - but the same thing could be accomplished with a wall of Fender Showman cabs.

Bottom line, if you find any in the back of someone's garage, the EV SRO 15's have good vintage value, but as for the cabs having modern practical use - take some nostalgic photos, and then they're firewood. Anyone looking for front direct firing rear loading bass horns - the JBL 4530 and 4520 are vastly superior, or else find plans for a Jensen Imperial.

[ChMo']

Also, most had blue flocked cabs and white flocked re-entrant horns, and a few red flocked cabs and some black flocked cabs.

[Enzo]

I recall our horns were white flocking, but I don;t recall any flock on the cabs, they were black, and smooth, either tolex or black paint.

[dwarner]

Found a photo of them...

[forearms]

So I was just looking up details on ARB PA Speaker Cabinets as when I was in high school in the mid 1980's I rescued one from the trash and wound up using it as my speaker cabinet attached to my guitar amp. Man I miss that thing, It was LOUD and my dad and I custom wired the speakers so I could toggle the horn tweeters and 15 inch woofers separately to provide more tone options . I wound up selling the entire rig when I right before I go married !! This thing was a beast