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UPDATE:  October 11, 2018

 

McIntosh Laboratory, Binghamton, NY

 

 

Skip to page ___ for photos of the McIntosh tour

 

Great American Audio Factory Tours

 

Many, many of you have taken tours of the premier American Audio factories across the USA, including the tour of the Klipsch factory in Hope Arkansas.  I started this thread for people to share their American audio factory tour experiences with us, both narrative and especially with photographs.

 

Richard Groves @guywithwine (Klipsch Museum of Audio History Founders Circle member and Fundraising Standing Committee Chairman) recently took a tour of the Cary Audio factory in Raliegh, North Carolina, so I thought we would start with Cary Audio because it is recent, and Cary Audio has been a great partner with Klipsch at shows such as CES when they both want to show off their great sounding stuff.

 

Bruce @Marvel is going to try and set up a tour of the Western Electric tube making factory in his area and, if they let him, share his experiences and photographs here as well.

 

Back to Cary Audio.  When Richard was taken into their the listening room at Cary Audio he was pleasantly surprised to see that he would be listening to the highly regarded Cary amps and preamps through a set of of handmade in the USA speakers a few of you might be familiar with.

 

American high-end audio and the factories they are made in.  More to come  . . . .

DSC_2939.JPG

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--- When I was having Dennis Had, founder of Cary Audio, build an amp for me we spoke several times and he mentioned his appreciation for Klipsch speakers and that he had owned a pair of LaScala's. When I talked about how I need and expect an amp to be extremely quiet he know exactly where I was coming from. 

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The photos are up in the Galery here.  There were all taken by Richard's wife as they were going through the Cary Audio factory.  I will be adding captions/descriptions after I have a chance to talk with Richard about what we are seeing.

 

Travis

 

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17 hours ago, dwilawyer said:

DSC_2903.jpg

DSC_2907.jpg

 

 

That can't be right.  Are you telling me that schematic ^^^ is the template for how the workers put those pre-amps together?  I was expecting something with a bunch of squiggly lines and pointy arrows.

 

Wow!  :o

+++

 

BTW if you want to make the pictures even smaller, once it has been loaded to the Klipsch forum software and you can see the picture (not link) click inside it and grab the lower left hand arrow then click and drag it to the top/left.

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26 minutes ago, wvu80 said:

That can't be right.  Are you telling me that schematic ^^^ is the template for how the workers put those amps together?  I was expecting something with a bunch of squiggly lines and pointy arrows.

 

Wow!  :o

+++

 

BTW if you want to make the pictures even smaller, click inside it and grab the lower left hand arrow then click and drag it to the top/left.

That lady, I will get her name, hS been working there FOREVER.   She is building a preamp.  I will see if I can find out which one.

 

The photo with Richard, on the right, with President 9f Cary, is in front of 805 power amps they are getting ready to fully assemble. 

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Nice to know about the lady.  Richard who?  Who's the president?  Nice pics.

 

Perhaps your pilgrimage should include include the VPI folks (in NJ), since they have done wonders for themselves and the industry.

 

I'd even be glad to drive to So, NH to visit the Basis factory, but don't know if you'd have many takers or how much there is to see there.  AJ sadly is gone, to a premature heart attack I believe, but his widow Jolanta is running the place, pretty well it seems.  

 

So, who's next?

 

Larry

 

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@dwilawyerThere are several Factory Tours on Youtube.  Are you thinking having a section for one manufacturer at a time, have some discussion/comments, then go on to the next one?  I don't know if you want first-hand tours by members, so please forgive if I've gotten off the beaten path.

 

EDIT:  After a quick consult, the plan is to go with tours that Klipschites actually visit.  After that is over, we can get to the other stuff as it comes up.

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2 hours ago, Schu said:

Do you have any idea what unit this is?

 

large.DSC_2898.JPG.3e82ed8c8137368aae9ac

 

--- looking at the size of the ceramic tube mount and of previous photos of several of these lined up I'd say they are 845 or 211 monoblocks. Both of those utilize the long, narrow Cary chassis. Plus note the single RCA output on the left = monoblock.

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2 hours ago, wvu80 said:

@dwilawyerThere are several Factory Tours on Youtube.  Are you thinking having a section for one manufacturer at a time, have some discussion/comments, then go on to the next one?  I don't know if you want first-hand tours by members, so please forgive if I've gotten off the beaten path.

 

Eminence used to make the woofers for Klipsch, I don't know if they still do.

 

 

We can do it whatever makes most sense.  A seperate thread for each factory, or keep them all in here together.  I think I would like the ones that Forum people did at first.  Then look for for other stuff. 

 

We had a tour lined up at VPI but they couldn't do it because shor staffed and key people gone (Munich show is this week), and they said they would send us a buunch of stuff.  

 

Travis

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25 minutes ago, dwilawyer said:

We can do it whatever makes most sense.  A seperate thread for each factory, or keep them all in here together.  I think I would like the ones that Forum people did at first.  Then look for for other stuff. 

No problem.  I like your idea, and this is a cool thread.

 

I have Edited that Eminence Youtube vid OUT so we can proceed with the plan.  😎

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16 hours ago, wvu80 said:

That can't be right.  Are you telling me that schematic ^^^ is the template for how the workers put those pre-amps together?  I was expecting something with a bunch of squiggly lines and pointy arrows.

 

Wow!  :o

+++

 

BTW if you want to make the pictures even smaller, once it has been loaded to the Klipsch forum software and you can see the picture (not link) click inside it and grab the lower left hand arrow then click and drag it to the top/left.

That is Monica, she has been with Cary Audio for 13 years.  @guywithwine will explain the drawings and has other schematics he is going to post.

 

I'm guessing that is a layout drawing for production, for how it is supposed to look, and that there are also parts lists and schematics in that binder for her to reference.

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