A brief history of ...

[Dukesy 0]

The Garrard story goes back a long way, to the 'Great War' of 1914-18 when Garrard the Crown Jewellers, were anxious to make a contribution to the war effort, but at the same time retain their skilled craftsmen.

In 1915 they rented a small building in Willesden, North West London, and formed the Garrard Engineering and Manufacturing Company, producing precision mechanisms for the Ministry of Defense.

 

After the war the gramophone became a popular source of home entertainment. Although manufacture of various parts, such as amplifiers and loudspeakers, had begun in Britain, most turntables were imported.

Garrard saw an opportunity here and decided to make a gramophone motor. Although experiments in electrical recording and reproduction had begun in Britain and America, early turntables were driven by spring motors.

 

Garrard's first spring motor, called the Number 1, was a quality design having a cast iron mainframe with a thick baseplate, between which were supported two strong coil springs. With a full wind it would play three ten-inch or two twelve-inch diameter records.

This turntable quickly became popular, so it was followed by several cheaper models and then a prestige model called the Garrard Super Spring Motor.

 

Business boomed and production reached 25,000 per week.

Garrard didn't stay long at Willesden. The company soon found a site in Swindon, Wiltshire, with a 27,000sq.ft. factory, later, the company continued to expand.

 

With the development of radio and the spread of electricity into homes, the management decided to research and produce electric gramophone motors.

 

The R.C.I. was a fearsomely heavy beast. It would accept up to ten shellac 78 rpm records, either ten or twelve inches diameter, and play them sequentially.

 

It was quickly followed by the R.C.I.A., which was similar, but the records could be mixed. The mechanism would sense their diameter and deposit the needle automatically on the correct spot at the beginning of a record, tripping at the end and retuming the arm to its rest. It would also switch off at the end of the last record.

 

Around this time Garrard cashed in on their mechanical expertise and began to manufacture clocks of various kinds, still maintaining their by now well known quality. Durng the 1939-45 war large quantities of clock type mechanisms were produced for use in strategic mining, course plotting, mine sweeping, radar and such like. After the war there was heavy competition from cheap clocks produced in subsidised factories, so in 1954 clock making was abandoned. Even in the early Thirties there was a recognised need for a high performance, heavy duty tumtable for broadcasting and recording studios, so Garrard designed and produced the Model 201.

 

It had a direct-drive electric motor, plus a heavy cast rotor carrying a twelve inch turntable. Its speed of 78 rpm was controlled by a three-ball governor, similar to that used on the first spring motor unit and it needed frequent oiling to minimise flutter. A special version was made for the B.B.C. for 'instant' starting.

 

Just before the 1939/45 war a complicated unit, the R.C. 100, was designed, which would accept and play both sldes of a stack of ten mixed ten and twelve-inch records. About a hundred were made and shipped to America, but the ship sank, the units were lost and they were never mentioned again.

 

After the war the company grew rapidly exporting 70% of its output throughout the world. The U.S.A. was a very strong market, taking about 50% of production, so an independent American company called Garrard Sales Inc. was formed. It sold their record changers directly into the retail market of the U.S.A. Later, more British products were taken on, among them Leak amplifiers, and Ersin Multicore solder, so the name was changed to Brtish Industries Corporation.

 

Great efforts were made by both companies to keep autochangers, the new name for record changers, at the forefront ofthe hi-fi market, because the difficulty of producing them to give good performance and reliability helped keep out foreign competition; it is much easier to make a single play turntable.

Over the years various high performance changers were made, the most popular being the R.C.80 and culminating in the Zero 100S, which had a precision parallel tracking pickup arm. But it was the budget SP25 that ended up in most homes, metamorphosing through numerous model changes to keep it competitive.

 

Despite the company's interest in mass production, it never lost slght of more serious hi-h requirements and in 1954 produced the world famous Model 301 turntable, with its high power motor, heavy cast aluminium turntable, three speeds with variable control and meticulously designed and produced bearings. The unit dominated the market for many years, until the need for an update was felt necessary; then the 401 was introduced.

 

The 401 was similar to the 301, but its motor was encased in a heavy iron cage to minimise hum induction into sensitive cartridges, notably Deccaís. Despite its similarity to the 301, extra features and attractive styling, the 401 was not as well accepted by the market; Garrard could never understand why.

 

The company didn't stick with turntables. An attempt was made in the early Sixties to break into the tape market with a cartridge tape deck, the Magazine Tape Deck. It was robustly made, featuring a plastic magazine enclosing two 4" tape spools. Most of these recorders were sold into the instrumentation field because record companies could not be persuaded to issue prerecorded tapes on the format; the Magazine was cumbersome compared to the Philips Compact Cassette which followed some time after, in 1963.

A total design change and tooling for mass production demands very high financial investment. When in 1959 the new 'Autoslim' series, including the SP25, was designed, Garrard teamed up with Plessey for assistance.

 

Plessey had proved their worth in the defense industry but had never significantly been able to break into the domestic market. This was their chance.

Plessey also used the Garrard name as a spearhead to enter the U.S. and quickly dispensed with the services of The British Industries Corporation. This proved to be a bad move for a variety of commercial reasons - and Japanese competition had begun to heat up as well. Garrard lost valuable U.S. sales and went into rapid decline, from which it never recovered.

 

When Plessey of England (remember, parent company of Garrard), set up distribution for Garrard products in another area of the US, it left AVNET, the owner of importer "British Industies Corp." (B-I-C) in a lurch without any turntables to sell. They got together with a company called V-M, who designed and brought out the first series of B-I-C turntables (and arguably, their best).

 

The performance of these could and did run circles around the typical Garrard, BSR and Miracord

 

Even though they were consistantly Consumer Reports "Best Buy" for years, they had a few problems, too. They didn't have the sex appeal of the other main contenders (Dual-Garrard-Miracord), they were the "new kid on the block", and mostly, had a high rate of out-of-the-box defectives.

 

The design was 'terrific'... and if it came out of the box working, it worked well and it worked quietly, and had a chance to survive through the 2 year warranty period without needing a service.

 

There were 'silly' warranty repairs... Some motor capacitors were bad, causing the units to spin backwards, some motor shafts would separate from the armatures, some grease dripped on a part that should have been clean, and renderered it inoperative, or a tonearm wire clip would come off!

 

The company found it best to mount a cartridge and do the setup for the customer, and give the unit a cursory check-out before it was shipped, or handed to the customer. These units almost never had any major problems (even the ill-fated 1000), and much could have been solved by something called "quality control", but once the reputation was there, it 'spelled disaster'.

 

They tried to get fancy with their next series...but other than putting extra plastic on a machine that really needed some refinements and quality-control, the company finally said goodbye to B-I-C turntables.

Keep in mind that this was the period of time that the Japanese (notably Technics) started to flood the American market with their well-built, simple and 'sexy' offerings.

 

Loricraft in the UK, apparently now manufacture a model 501 and are rebuilding the famed 301 and 401 models.

 

In 1979, Garrod it was sold to the Brazilian company Gradiente Electronica. From employing no fewer than 4500 people in the early Seventies, the company ended up with a staff of four who continued to work in Swindon until June 1992.

Then the operation was finally closed.

 

In the U.S., the "Garrard" name was bought up by Service Merchandise Co, but the product had no similarities to the "real" Garrard.

 

The Service Merchandise Co, like Garrard, has also ceased to exist!

 

various sources

[YourBigEvent 0]

erm..................thanks

[Gary 0]

I wonder what Garrard are doing now. http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/huh.gif

[Dukesy 0]

http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/flirt.gif

 

I posted this to bring a tear to the eye of the 'older DJ' - who may well have used Garrard Turn Tables at gigs.

 

Mikeee, do you remember the great war?

 

http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/071.gif

 

 

[YourBigEvent 0]

I remember Garrard, black and silver mostly, very plasticy, used with a Hand H amp !!

[RobbieD 0]

Ahhh Memories!

 

My first mobile system had Garrard decks.

 

OK, I feel really old now.

[ChrisPointon 0]

Look Kids! - back in the days when you were just an evil glint in the Milkmans Eye and Gary was wearing short trousers......... this is what Uncle Mikeee and Spin used to use http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/rolleyes.gif

 

 

http://i2.sell.com/0/223/8383/2/178/185308-l.jpg

 

Actually Mikeee is possibly more familiar with this...

 

 

http://www.mechanicalmusic.co.uk/images/largeshots/dscf0041.jpg

[Gary 0]

I think that top one was one of the decks I started out with...it had 4 speeds, 16(!) 33.3, 45, and good ol' 78....

 

It used to reach 78rpm by using the 33 and 45 motors at the same time http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/wacko.gif

 

The deck on the other side of my mixer, wasnt the same...that was a BSR I think?

 

Now, I just use one Technics at gigs for a bit of vinyl playing.

 

 

 

By the way, if I ever get my webspace working (Im pretty close now, I've upload stuff, but cant work out the correct link/URL to view them via the WWW), I'm going to post some LINKS to really old disco gear pictures from 30+ years ago...and you thought that rope lights were retro....

 

If the terms "3 planes of movement" or "separate lamp and motor circuits" or "requires 40 x 4515 bulbs" ring any bells...you'll be in for a scarey look back... if those terms mean nothing to you...some of the items will simply have you hiding behind the sofa... http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/fear.gif http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/scared.gif

[Melody_Roadshow 0]

http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/huh.gif I still have a Direct Drive Garrard turntable tucked up at home...

Someone caught a look at it recently and offered me £90 there and then, but seeing as its the only one i have i'm keeping it http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[DJshaggy 0]

that made a very interesting read on my lunch browse of DJU thanks discodirect

[mikeee 0]

I never had a "round" gramaphone, but in the loft I do have a "Cylinder" player, which I think is dated 1891.

 

I started with SP25's, then the 401 with SME arms, then unfortunatly those cheap wafer thin Macdonald's came along - Wasn't it the MP3?? or similar

 

 

[stevemarshall 0]

 

thanks for the post I remember using Garrard SP25 decks when I started gigging in the mid 70's

 

of course there were also BSR decks, made in the Tillie and Henderson factory in Derry N.Ireland....

 

Plus of course the fab Gates turntables used by Radio 1 and Capital etc in the early days:) made in America!

Edited April 12, 2004 by stevemarshall

[mikeee 0]

Ah!!!! Gates, the one with the spin dryer motor hanging underneath and the speed changer that looked like a gear stick from a sports car. Heavy as well.

[stevemarshall 0]

yup and great decks too we once did a race to see which came quicker up to speed a Technics or Gates turntable

 

The Gates won!

[big dave shirt 0]

A facinating in-sight to the world of garrard,i myself own and use three 401's which when set up are a treat to work with,but alas spares are gold-dust.I have two with sme mk11 arms shure carts,and one with a goldring arm with an ortophon head,have gigged them for years,but for hard use i found goldring gl 72 or gl85 came out on top for punishment.All the best Dave