- Tripletone was a small electronics manufacturing company
based just outside London. When I first got in touch with them
in 1969 they were pretty much at the end of their lifespan -
no sign of business can be found after 1975. Their models were
quite practical, but with a rather outdated cosmetical design
- sort of kit-like. The Brits' obviously liked it, though. But
they have always had the capability to look under the skin. The
amplifiers had genuine glass fronts and dual-concentric tone
controls - even a midrange control. I imported some samples of
their 10-watt stereo amplifier, a simple stereo FM tuner and
some speakers. Their speaker cabinets had a rather unwieldy (ugly)
design, and had a dual-cone 8 in. full-range speaker installed.
Later this was coupled to a separate 4 in. tweeter, rather like
an afterthought. Even if these units played quite well - didn't
cost much, either, I understood fairly quickly that Tripletone
was not the future for me. However, not before I had been inspired
to "borrow" some from their name - Tri-Tone Stereo
it was! I believe some of these first units are still going strong
here. At the same time I got in touch with The Ferrograph Company
- manufacturers of very sturdy reel-to-reel tape recorders. Tripletone
had to yield. Today I know more about Tripletone than I did then
- thanks to the good assistance of mr. Gwillliam-Rees of Savoy
Hill Publications in England. When I got into the picture ('69)
Tripletone had a much reduced product range. Going back only
a few years they had several integrated and power tube amps,
tube preamps as well as some other tube gadgets. For a while
they manufactured both tube and transistorized units. They also
made their own dual-cone speaker drivers! Today, many of their
tube products would have been highly sought after.
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