Sansui made by Technics???

[BilboBaggins]

I was browsing around the other day, and saw a Sansui R30 receiver. Nothing really special, but one of the pictures jumped out at me. When you look at the back of the receiver, you will notice the speaker connects are not standard Sansui. In fact, to me, they look like they were made by Technics. I had an SV-707 which had broken speaker posts and I bought a cheapie technics receiver for $5 so I could get the speaker connects.

Does anyone know if Sansui had Technics contracted into making some of their components? I thought I would post this because I haven't seen this before.

https://www.canuckaudiomart.com/det...-watts-phono-in-made-in-japan/images/2163862/

 

[Sansui77]

Yep, I reckon Technics had something to do with some of Sansui's CD players.

 

[Sansuiman]

^ yes on Technics involvement in later Sansui cd players, but no on the R-30. Sansui, like several other companies in the early 80's, flirted with those rotary locking connectors for speaker - and antenna - connections. Technics may have been the first to implement them, but certainly not the only outfit to incorporate them into their designs.

I've seen those on a few Hitachi and Toshiba models, and others as well. They were just the new, stylish thing at the time and likely less expensive than the previously used spring-loaded terminal designs. They also accomodate somewhat larger speaker cable, which was starting to become an issue in 1980.

I'm thinking they also gave the impression of binding posts, which by 1980 were considered the speaker terminal of choice for high end amps, and so an inexpensive knockoff of real binding posts was created for marketing and appearance reasons. Really, these terminals weren't terrible when new - they worked as intended - but decades later they are easily broken due to the plastic aging.

As an aside, I recently learned that Sansui offered one Laserdisc player in 1985, the SV-L1000. it was a straight rebadge (minimal effort made to mask it's origin) of the Pioneer CLD-900. So there we have Sansui going to Pioneer for an OEM'd product. It was 1985 though, which was a tough time for Sansui, and I expect they were getting desperate to gain share in the home video market as sales of audio gear had slumped badly. Since they probably lacked the ability to develop an LD player in-house, they went right to the source.

 

[BilboBaggins]

I remember quite a bit of that. I had a Hitachi Lazerdisc player in the late 80s(?) with the CD tray that sits in the LD tray. And they used the same Laser as far as I know. Anyway, it was an exact duplicate of a Pioneer model. Even the remotes were interchangeable.

 

[Sansuiman]

I'm going totally of topic here, but considering Pioneer was the major player in LD, it would be expected they would do OEM"d decks for others interested in offering one, particularly the MCA Discovision line (oof, there is a lousy name for marketing purposes).

I never got that much into laserdisc, almost considered getting a deck and a small collection of discs of movies that didn't get a proper (or any) DVD release, but quickly lost interest. Thus, my knowledge of them - and who was making versus who was faking - is almost nil.

The one movie I really wanted that was properly released on LD but only had a piss-poor VHS scan and pan version (and no DVD release even now AFAIK) was Colussus: The Forbin Project. I finally taped it off of either AMC or Fox movie channel (presented in original wide screen format) and that was 20+ years ago. Still have that tape. An interesting (if flat out depressing) flick for sure.

I couldn't justify adding the hardware for just a few titles, and with the age of the players, I was spooked about laser and mechanical failures leaving me with an oversized door stop. Thus ended my brief consideration of taking up LD. I still think the format is cool on technical merit alone, but my interest in such dead media has long since passed. Of course I say that having just picked up a Sansui SD-7000 reel to reel deck recently, so go figure.

Sansui historically had surprisingly little product sourced as straight-out rebadges of another makers gear until the mid 80's. They did, however, involve third parties in consulting roles on design and manufacture. We know they dealt with Micro-Seiki on some of the high-spec turntables. They worked briefly with Diatone on speaker design for the Japanse market (an arrangement that turned out to be short lived and not particularly fruitful) and I'm sure there were other such instances.

For what was apparently a very modest sized company, they were quite prolific in doing their own design and manufacture. If you compare the scale of their operation to Sony or Yamaha, it is quite remarkable what they accomplished.

 

[LBPete]

Many Japanese companies used the same suppliers. You will see similarities in components like speaker terminals because it's likely that Sansui and Toshiba sourced their speaker terminals from suppliers. In the mid '70s when production numbers were huge, the audio companies could contract with suppliers to produce a unique, brand specific terminal. In the '80s when sales were lower, and cost cutting was a major concern, generic "off the shelf" terminals would have been more attractive so you are likely to see more crossover between brands.

Another thing to consider is Sansui's extensive use of contractors. It is possible that Sansui contracted with Toshiba or a common contractor to produce some models.

- Pete

 

[BilboBaggins]

I had only ever seem that type of speaker terminal on Technics before this. I had had to change the terminals on a SV-707 and I found the exact same terminals on a cheap technics receiver I found at a thrift for $5. This is why I was so surprised. What you say makes sense, more so than my idea that Sansui subbed the receiver out to Technics.

 

[THF2]

These are the same type of connectors that are on my JBL L 212’s.

I don’t like them as they are not durable especially when connecting in the matching sub-woffer.

 

[BilboBaggins]

Yes, I was reading a speaker thread yesterday and saw that in a picture. I don't like them either.