When I worked for Garrard

[DonH56]

Frank, you have no idea how fascinating this thread is.

Ditto!

 

[Newk Yuler]

I have an old Garrard in the closet...

Like this one:

Functionality aside, that thing is beautiful. Some modern turntable company might find a niche in the market for building nice quality turntables with classic styling similar to that.

 

[JJB70]

Most of the turntables made whilst I was there were inexpensive but IMO good for their price.
The little clip in cartridge carrier, for example, gave a less peaky output from the cartridge than an SME type at many times the price.
The top model was the 401. It was a carefully engineered heavyweight for pro use.
I remember at the time it was £72 and the Linn LP12 was £300. The Linn probably cost 25% as much to make as the 401 but back then Garard worked on cost + 10% margin, whereas I am sure Linn were basing their price on what people would pay.
The 401 had always been made in batches on the production line but sales had dwindled and so the assembly was put into a room where a skilled lady hand built each one. The guys re-costed it and worked out a new, inevitably higher, price and sales volume shot up again.
The power of more expensive = better.

This paragraph sums up high end audio more concisely and effectively than just about anything I have ever read.

 

[anmpr1]

I have an old Garrard in the closet...

Like this one:

View attachment 30438

I think your photo pretty much sums up Garrard's problem. First, make no mistake about it, as a turntable company they most likely would have gone under no matter what they did, due to digits. But even before that happened, the company was mostly tied to the record changer. Sure, they made the 301/401, but I don't think it was ever exported in significant numbers to the US, and they certainly never advertised it. We had a couple of Garrard dealers in my mid-sized town, and none stocked it.

Next: software. Record changers were their stock product, and changers were viable when kids were mostly stacking 45s. For elders, some classical sets and opera discs were cut in a changer format. That is, on a 3 record set, the first disc would have side 1 and 6, etc. So you could stack the records and listen to the entire program in order. But by the mid to late 60s most record companies had abandoned that, and records were laid out for manual play. The changer had become rather useless for 'serious' audiophile work.

Next: all Garrards I ever experienced, and I owned a handful, were rather clunky in their automatic operation. Contrast that with Duals, or the BIC models, which were much smoother in operation. That said, nothing matched the odd-ball Technics SL-1650 changer, which was very liquid in operation.

Next: who hasn't used a changer and experienced a stack of records falling down on the tonearm? In this respect, the Garrard 'two point' hold down system was better than the single spindle thing. Yet is was not foolproof.

Finally, with the advent of high priced and high compliant phono cartridges, the changer just wasn't considered a suitable match.

Garrard to me seemed kind of like the British car industry. That is probably not fair, since nothing electro-mechanical was probably worse than British Leyland and Lucas, but still... the company seemed not happy or interested in changing, adapting to the times and confronting competition.

 

[Frank Dernie]

So when was the decision made to introduce direct drive turntables? The DD-75 sure looks like a Japanese DD motor unit with Garrard electronics, but with a big solid platter.

Everything except the motor and electronics was Garrard. There was no electronics manufacture there.
There is a funny story to on the DD75.
The designer was an older engineer who had started recently and it turned out the had drawn everything in inches rather than SI units.
The (young) prototype shop guy came into the DO and asked the designer how he was expected to split one component. After a bit of head scratching, the designer didn't recognise the part, they realised it was a 1:25.4 scale model of a counterweight...

 

[anmpr1]

My 'ideal' imaginary scenario would have been for Garrard, in the '70s, to have said, "Screw it. We're going to get something better and more modern going." Ditch the changer thing. Forget in-house manufacturing for precision parts. Contract out with an outfit like Japan's Shinagawa Musen company and have them develop a precision example of the Z-100 arm using high quality bearings. VTA adjustable and of medium mass. Match it to either a DD with a real suspension, or suspended belt drive--something with a higher level of fit/finish than the pretty crude looking Linn. I bet they (or someone) could have done that for cost parity with whatever Linn was selling their turntable/arm for--and they weren't giving their Sondek away for nothing, that's for sure.

But again, whatever they did or didn't do, it would have probably been a lost cause. I think the market just left Garrard standing by the wayside. Changers went out of favor, and cassettes killed the low end turntable market. What was left? Garrard never really pushed the envelope with their higher end stuff. Dual (and a few others from that era) hung around a bit longer, but soon no one wanted what they were selling, either. By the time of digits, it was all over.

I have a soft spot for the company, but like my two erstwhile MGs, don't miss them, other than my Z-100, which I would not sell. Not sure anyone would want it, though.

 

[anmpr1]

One last thing about the pantograph arm, which as I've said is a genius design, IMO. Garrard actually updated the design, creating a magnesium alloy, lower mass version. I don't know if they did that in-house, however I have no reason to think that it wasn't an improvement over the original arm. But what did they do with it? At the time when everyone and his brother was moving away from record changers, they put the new arm on--you guessed it, a record changer. And it was not just any changer, it was probably one of the ugliest changers Garrard ever made, from an aesthetic standpoint. I mean, it was as if this company was just looking for excuses not to go under.

 

[Frank Dernie]

One last thing about the pantograph arm, which as I've said is a genius design, IMO. Garrard actually updated the design, creating a magnesium alloy, lower mass version. I don't know if they did that in-house, however I have no reason to think that it wasn't an improvement over the original arm. But what did they do with it? At the time when everyone and his brother was moving away from record changers, they put the new arm on--you guessed it, a record changer. And it was not just any changer, it was probably one of the ugliest changers Garrard ever made, from an aesthetic standpoint. I mean, it was as if this company was just looking for excuses not to go under.

View attachment 30613

I have no idea what the Garrard importers into the USA (I assume you must be USian) prioritised, but here there were practically no record changers being sold by Garrard. All the popular decks were single players, though some had interchangeable long centre spindle with a mechanism and a pop-up support so they could be used with a stack if the owner so desired. My first one (SL75) had this option but I never took it out of the box and only used it with the standard short spindle.
The pantograph arm works well, any free play is taken up by stylus thrust so is a non-issue in use. Everything was designed and made in house.
The controls were awful (as I wrote before) because the stylist wasn't an engineer so rather than having a bit of bent wire next to the arm as the cueing lever it had a mechanism connected to a lever at the front. No way to make it nice at the selling price. IIRC the cueing system cost about 50x as much to make as the Pioneer PL12d just because the styling had been signed off by management, the same management that failed unsurprisingly.

 

[anmpr1]

I have no idea what the Garrard importers into the USA (I assume you must be USian) prioritised, but here there were practically no record changers being sold by Garrard.

My first hi-fi store experience was at a retailer that sold Garrard. I think this was around 1970 or so. I'd never been in a real hi-fi store. The place had the line of Garrards in their window. From the lowly Model 30 (I think it was called) to the SL-95, with the wood tonearm. I walked in and they featured two particular models in their 'supreme' system. One was the Pioneer PL-61, and the other was the 100. I'd never seen anything like those. I could only afford a Garrard Sl-55. Then I bought the Sl-72. Then I bought a Z-100. Then a ton of other turntables from other manufacturers. You know how it is, as a gearhead. Still use a 100, which does one thing better than all my other tables. Also have two other DD models I never got rid of. But the Garrard got me started on the road to hi-fidelia.

 

[watchnerd]

I have an old Garrard in the closet...

Like this one:

View attachment 30438

What's that vertical doohickey in the back left corner?

 

[Frank Dernie]

What's that vertical doohickey in the back left corner?

That is very old version of the support for the record stack rims for the auto-changer.
There were several possible autochanger mechanisms over the years though there weren't any new auto-changers being designed when I was there.

 

[watchnerd]

That is very old version of the support for the record stack rims for the auto-changer.
There were several possible autochanger mechanisms over the years though there weren't any new auto-changers being designed when I was there.

So that must be why the spindle is so long and bent at the top?

That would seem to lead to wobbling...

 

[somebodyelse]

So that must be why the spindle is so long and bent at the top?

That would seem to lead to wobbling...

Assuming it works in a similar way to the later ones, the bend 'spindle' is static and attached to the chassis. At least that's how I remember it - ot's been a few years since I've seen one close up.

 

[Frank Dernie]

So that must be why the spindle is so long and bent at the top?

That would seem to lead to wobbling...

The spindle doesn't rotate on an autochanger. It does mean the thrust bearing is a ball bearing rather than a single point. I would imagine there is a video of an autochanger working somewhere.
One of the problems is non-standard and manufacturing tolerance of record thickness leading to the mechanism sometimes dropping 2 records at a time, and, with worn holes in much used records, all of them...

 

[RayDunzl]

What's that vertical doohickey in the back left corner?

If you choose to use the auto-changer feature:

The tall notched bent stationary spindle will hold a stack of records.

The entire doohickey moves in an out for different record diameters, and supports the edge of the leaning stack. The little arm with the wheels is spring loaded and presses down lightly on the edge of the stacked records

When it is time for a record to drop, the doohickey has a little finger that pushes against the edge of the bottom record on the stack, encouraging it to fall down past the notch in the spindle.

It usually worked, but not 100%.

I usually didn't use it, as it was not mandatory.

Seems like the spindle pulls out, and a short straight spindle was also provided.

 

[RayDunzl]

Along the same lines of ancient tech...

Recently cleaned out the bottom shelf of the cabinet in the garage.

There were some ancient unopened cans of Quaker State Motor Oil, likely from the early 70's.

I figured to open the cans and pour the contents into the recycle container.

No go. The contents had turned to jelly.

I was a bit surprised by that, figuring it would still be "good".

Now I want to save a bottle of synthetic and see what happens, but I may already be too old. All of my 1980 vintage Mobil 1 got used.

 

[watchnerd]

If you choose to use the auto-changer feature:

The tall notched bent stationary spindle will hold a stack of records.

View attachment 30619

The entire doohickey moves in an out for different record diameters, and supports the edge of the leaning stack. The little arm with the wheels is spring loaded and presses down lightly on the edge of the stacked records

View attachment 30618

When it is time for a record to drop, the doohickey has a little finger that pushes against the edge of the bottom record on the stack, encouraging it to fall down past the notch in the spindle.

View attachment 30620View attachment 30621

It usually worked, but not 100%.

I usually didn't use it, as it was not mandatory.

Seems like the spindle pulls out, and a short straight spindle was also provided.

Wow...what what an interesting piece of engineering, thanks for that tutorial.

I'm actually a bit surprised it even worked.

But what was this even necessary, compared to the centrally loaded pancake stack changers with arm underneath that came later?

 

[Xulonn]

My first HiFi (monaural) system (1958 - I was a 16 y/o HS student) included a Garrard changer like this one:

At the time, as an only child, I lived with my adopted parents in a two bedroom bungalow on Chicago's south side. (Modern Google picture - hasn't changed much since 1958)

My parents owned a Stromberg-Carlson console HiFi (the Fi wasn't very high) with AM/FM/SW radio bands, turntable - I remember it as being very much like this one from an internet picture...

...and they owned a few 12" monaural LP's, and a couple of "albums" of 78rpm classical music "records" like this one:

78rpm record sets (albums) came with, for instance, "sides 1+8, 2+7, 3+6 & 4+5 respectively on four disks, so you could load an album stack on the spindle and listen to sides 1, 2, 3, and 4, and then remove and flip the stack, and listen to sides 5, 6, 7, and 8. More on 78's HERE.

And now you youngsters know where the term "record album" came from. I find it fascinating that the terminology survived to indicate any collection of songs on any medium from LP to analog tape to CD and even digital media that contains a collection of songs that is analogous to a binder full of 78's!

I wonder if the short length of many popular songs is related to the approximately three-minute max available on a 10" 78rpm monaural record. A lot of pop music 45rpm records were less than three minutes long. Then again, the term "albums" also survived into the internet/digital storage age.

 

[Frank Dernie]

All of my 1980 vintage Mobil 1 got used.

When we tested Mobil 1 against the Valvoline racing oil we had been using we found we could run the engine hotter without loss of power. Smaller radiators and ducts was a significant loss of drag and more downforce too since less of the flow was being diverted.
One of the few really good steps forward. We continued using it for years.

 

[Frank Dernie]

My first HiFi (monaural) system (1958 - I was a 16 y/o HS student) included a Garrard changer like this one:
View attachment 30622

At the time, as an only child, I lived with my adopted parents in a two bedroom bungalow on Chicago's south side. (Modern Google picture - hasn't changed much since 1958)
View attachment 30624

My parents owned a Stromberg-Carlson console HiFi (the Fi wasn't very high) with AM/FM/SW radio bands, turntable - I remember it as being very much like this one from an internet picture...
View attachment 30625

...and they owned a few 12" monaural LP's, and a couple of "albums" of 78rpm classical music "records" like this one:
View attachment 30623
78rpm record sets (albums) came with, for instance, "sides 1+8, 2+7, 3+6 & 4+5 respectively on four disks, so you could load an album stack on the spindle and listen to sides 1, 2, 3, and 4, and then remove and flip the stack, and listen to sides 5, 6, 7, and 8. More on 78's HERE.

And now you youngsters know where the term "record album" came from. I find it fascinating that the terminology survived to indicate any collection of songs on any medium from LP to analog tape to CD and even digital media that contains a collection of songs that is analogous to a binder full of 78's!

I wonder if the short length of many popular songs is related to the approximately three-minute max available on a 10" 78rpm monaural record. A lot of pop music 45rpm records were less than three minutes long. Then again, the term "albums" also survived into the internet/digital storage age.

I have old LP boxed sets of classical works with the sides cut like that for use on an autochanger. Confusing for the unsuspecting!