Why an automatic turntable from Swindon, England has made it big in the States.
At the risk of seeming immodest, we've had a smashing success in the United States.
There are more Garrards being used in component stereo systems here than all other makes combined.
Even we find this curious.
But the die was cast thirty-odd years ago.
Not parity, but superiority H. V. Slade, then Managing Director of Garrard Limited, decreed, "We will sell a Garrard in the U.S. only when it is more advanced than any machine made there." A commitment to, not parity, but absolute superiority.
That policy has not changed to this day.
Spurred by it, Garrard of England has been responsible for every major innovation in automatic turntables.
In the thirties, Garrard pioneered the principle of two-point record support. Still the safest known method of record handling. Oddly, still a Garrard exclusive.
In the forties, we introduced the aluminum tone arm. Today, widely used by makers of fine equipment.
By 1961, increasingly sensitive cartridges had led us to adapt a feature originally developed for professional turntables: the dynamically balanced tone arm, with a movable counterweight to neutralize the arm and an adjustment to add precisely the recommended stylus tracking force.
In 1964, we added an anti-skating control, and patented the sliding H. V. Slade (1889-1961) weight design that makes it permanently accurate.
Then, in 1967, Garrard engineers perfected the Synchro-Lab motor, a revolutionary two-stage synchronous motor.
The induction portion supplies the power to reach playing speed instantly. The synchronous section then "locks in" to the 60-cycle frequency of the current to give unvarying speed-and unvarying reproduction-despite variations in voltage.
"We're bloody flattered" This year one of our competitors has introduced a copy of our Synchro-Lab motor on its most expensive model.
To quote Alan Say, our Head of Engineering, "We're bloody flattered.
"After all, being imitated is a rather good measure of how significant an innovation really is." The new Garrard SL95B features still another development we expect will become an industry standard.
Some years back we pioneered viscous damped tone arm descent for gentler, safer cueing. Ever since, we've been troubled by the logic of offering an automatic turntable with a damped tone arm that wasn't damped in automatic cycle.
This year we've added a linkage system between the changer mechanism and the damped tone arm "jack." So, for the time being at least, Garrard has the only damped tone arm that is also damped in automatic.
Other 1970 Garrard refinements include a counterweight adjustment screw for balancing the tone arm to within a hundredth of a gram. A window scale on the tone arm for the stylus force gauge. And a larger, more precise version of our patented anti-skating control.
Un-innovating At the same time, we've eliminated a feature we once pioneered. A bit of un-innovating, you might say.
Garrard's disappearing record platform is disappearing for good.
We've replaced it with a non-disappearing record platform. A larger, stronger support with an easy-to-grasp clip that fits surely over the record stack.
A small thing, perhaps.
But another indication that H.V.'s commitment remains with us.
$44.50 to $129.50
Garrard standards do not vary with price. Only the degree of refinement possible for the money.
There are six Garrard component models from the SL9513 automatic turntable (at left) for $129.50 to the 40B at $44.50. Your dealer can help you arrive at the optimum choice for your system.
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(High Fidelity)
Also see:
ELPA/PE-2020 Turntable (ad, Jan. 1970)
Benjamin--stereo component compact (ad, Jan. 1970)
Stanton Model 881S phono cartridge (Equip. Report, Nov. 1977)
Fisher receivers (ad, Jan. 1970)