Bose 301 modifications

   I'm not laughing at all. Many years ago I also went down the Bose path believing that it was a well respected brand offering good performance before discovering what real hifi was. In retrospect, Bose was and still is, mediocre equipment at inflated prices.

   That said, I once owned a pair of Bose 301's. At that time they fulfilled my needs until I acquired a pair used 901's with the included Bose equalizer that is critical to their performance. These speakers were several years old. The sound was just OK. As an Internet junkie I researched on how to improve the performance of the speakers. With the age of the speakers it seemed that a common flaw was with the deterioration of the foam surrounds of the drivers. I bought a repair kit and spent several hours replacing the surrounds. The kit also included an adhesive to attach the new surrounds. The speakers sounded better after that.

   So, before trying things such as drilling holes and cutting things inspect to see if the foam surrounds are deteriorated. With speakers of that age it is very possible. You will know if they are shot because when you touch them they will just wilt like sand.

   I never disassembled the 301's but for the 901's it was as simple as removing the front grill and rear baffle. Then the drivers were all exposed. There are still available repair kits for the 301's. I would inspect the condition of the surrounds before doing anything else.

You'll never turn that sow's ear into a silk purse.  The best thing you can do for them is to get the Loki equalizer from Schiit and try to fix the sound electronically.

I would think that if you were to swap out the speakers, they would have to have the same parameters as the old ones because the crossovers are speaker specific.

The, "crossover" in 301s was a single, cheap, aluminum electrolytic capacitor(I’ve forgotten whether it was 4 or 6 uF). I used to stock/sell the drivers, purchased from Madisound(who carried the manufacturing over-runs from Bose’s supplier), for(literally) a couple Bucks each. You might call them, for suggestions on what woofers will fit the holes and perform well in the cabinet volume, properly matched tweeters(efficiency/dB), as well as an actual crossover. https://www.madisoundspeakerstore.com Virtually anything would be an upgrade.

I’d buy new drivers and crossovers, and then put them in a different box.  Use the bose speakers in your fireplace to heat your home for an evening!