Equivalence classes in the Weyl groups of type Bn

We consider two families of equivalence classes in the Weyl groups of type B _n which are suggested by the study of left cells in unequal parameter Iwahori-Hecke algebras. Both families are indexed by a non-negative integer r. It has been shown that the first family coincides with left cells corresponding to the equal parameter Iwahori-Hecke algebra when r=0; the equivalence classes in the second family agree with left cells corresponding to a special class of choices of unequal parameters when r is sufficiently large. Our main result shows that the two families of equivalence classes coincide, suggesting the structure of left cells for remaining choices of the Iwahori-Hecke algebra parameters.