@stereo5, no hostility intended. The point was just why drop in to post something negative towards the subject matter selected. Seems easier to add something constructive or just move on.
American Made Audio Products
I just came upon this and wondered if anyone else has seen this website. I try to support the home team when I can so this is interesting, at least as a resource, and not a sales tool. I apologize in advance if I’m late to the game on this but interesting to hear anyones thoughts, knowledge, etc. Thanks. https://americanmadeaudio.com/
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Added AGD Productions, Millennia Media, and updated Benchmark's listing categories. https://americanmadeaudio.com/the-list/ |
Several moons ago working while in college I landed a dream job, working in the only high end shop in town, The Speaker Shop in NE Ohio. All the awesome perks of the job made it great. Fun customers, study while working, listen to music all day and all the Irish coffee you can drink. All while surrounded by great domestic and UK gear. Our area is solidly union leaning. GM one of the bigger employers in the area. One day a customer comes in he is looking to begin getting into hifi. I put together a couple of nice systems and he listens. Impressed he picks out a really nice pair of speakers, TDL reference monitors, he’s fine with the fact that they are from the UK. But then we get stumped for power. He does not believe that Cary Audio is truly a US company, it’s not in a book he has from his trade union. Frustrated he leaves the shop without the gear he liked. Next day he returns, he’s made some calls and is now satisfied the Cary is made here in the US. He happily apologized and picks up his new system. It mattered to him as a customer and us as a store, the US makes some of the best designed and built hifi in the world. There are also countless companies from other countries that do as well no doubt about it. But when I buy, my first checkbox is does it sound great, my second is where was it built.. |
I felt the need to elaborate somewhat. Don't get me wrong, there is plenty of high quality gear out there made all over the world. There are components that a particular country just seems to have a knack for and I will buy them. However it do try to be aware when I spend. Careful to promote through my dollars, companies and or countries that pay workers livable wages. |
@doyle3433 Excellent story. When I’m looking to purchase, I always want to know where the gear is made. I ask salesman that specific question, because they ought to know off the cuff and not have to look it up. If it’s a toss up between two items, all things being equal, I usually pick the US company. |
Oswalds Mills: https://oswaldsmillaudio.com/story Our slate, from which our turntables, plinths, equipment racks and even some amplifiers are fashioned, comes from the last two functioning quarries in Pennsylvania. It is cut on a state of the art five axis water jet machine owned and operated by a Mennonite family, surrounded by Mennonite farms. Once cut, the slate is honed by hand using water and diamond tooling and abrasives. The hardwoods we use to make our speakers, amplifiers and audio furniture grow in the surrounding forests of Pennsylvania and are sustainably harvested. Our woods typically require years of careful air and then kiln drying, and we also use cutting edge new processes like torrefaction that literally cook the wood to improve its tonality and increase its stability. We have our own 15,000 square foot wood shop with both state of the art CNC machines and also antique woodworking machines and equipment which allow us to build things no one else makes today. Today Oswald's Mill functions as the lab and reference collection informing the acoustical design and engineering of all OMA products. Our large collection of vintage professional tube amplifiers, speakers and turntables stretching back to the 1930’s allows us a proper standard by which to judge and inspires what we create, using the best ideas and practices from the past. In 2019 we started Fleetwood Sound Company, a new division of OMA. We created FSC to produce a new line of smaller, more affordable audio components while retaining the ultra high build quality and design as our OMA line. Loudspeakers with the same solid hardwoods, hand rubbed natural finishes (oil and wax), conical horns and innovative audio engineering driven design made within reach. Built under the same roof as OMA in Pennsylvania, next to the factory that made the Fleetwood motor car synonymous with "world’s finest". |
I picked up a new Rogue pre-amp from Northern Audio in Pitt. Beautiful shop, and Mark was awesome to deal with. Of course I just can't go into a shop for 15min. I was there for an hour and a half. He had a pair of the Deville's and I was in love!! I am saving up for a pair of my own. Everything about them, just beautiful! They are a perfect example of what the US can produce in the market, by craftsmen and artisans who care deeply about their product. They were really something to behold. |
@stereo5 +1 |
Bruce Thigpen invented his Eminent Technology LFT driver in response to the original, single-ended Magnepan planar-magnetic drivers, still found in most Magnepan models. I own a pair of Magnepan’s Tympani T-IVa, which features single-ended bass and midrange planar-magnetic drivers, with a push-pull true ribbon tweeter. Single ended means magnets on only one side of the Mylar diaphram; as the conductive wire glued onto the Mylar moves away from the magnet, control of the movement of the Mylar decreases with distance. For that reason the more expensive Magnepans (for example the MG20) contain push-pull drivers, with magnets on both sides of the Mylar diaphram. In a push-pull design, the conductive element of the driver remains within the magnetic field at all excursion distances. ALL Eminent Technology LFT drivers are push-pull, for lowest distortion magnetic-planar performance. The push-pull LFT-8b retails for $2499/pr, only slightly more than the single-ended Magnepan MG1.7i. I’ve compared the two; have you? In his Absolute Sound review of the LFT-8b, Robert Greene remarked on the very evident low distortion nature of the sound the 8b creates. A ridiculously-overlooked hi-fi bargain. All parts made in house, in Florida U.S.A.
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Nice graphs. What are they of? I have no idea. Who cares? I can draw some graphs of Bose 901's that look wonderful--their ads have young, serious-looking men in long white lab coats and Buddy Holly glasses standing around with clipboards attesting to their "accuracy." I am still laughing, 50 years later... What I DO KNOW is that any box, horn, electrostat, ANYTHING other than Maggies changes what you put into it. YOU may find that pleasing--in my shop, I sold you whatever you liked since we ran a business. BUT, when the doors closed and we put the BEST STUFF into every speaker we had, only one reproduced what we put into it exactly. Deal with it. |
@ditusa + 1 |
@stereo5 + 2 |
@ditusa , Thank you once again sir! |
@darkj , great website! It is a significant amount of work for a consumer to understand when a product is “Made in USA”, versus “Assembled in USA.” I had this conversation with Dan Airens from Airens snowblowers about ten years ago, and that conversation led Airens to change the labeling on their line of snowblowers they were selling at Home Depot at that time. They misunderstood the FTC rules regarding labeling. |
@jimijack , your comment about McIntosh isn’t true. Perhaps you should research, then edit accordingly. |
@darkj , it seems you forgot JL Audio…? |
While with some designs it’s hard to get all American-made inc fasteners etc. But on a few loudspeakers, I build every year I use 80% American no Chinese parts. All my cabinetry is hand-made in the WI USA with American materials glues and fasteners. Many of the speaker brands listed as American use Chinese cabinets crossover parts wire fasteners glues and drivers. So what is really made in America the McIntosh XR100 is 100% Chinese made. One needs to do research if country of origin matters. |
As everyone knows we live in a global economy and much of the design, testing and manufacturing along with parts / sub - assemblies often come from different parts of the globe for all types of products. As such, I’d wager ~10% of the list of companies truly meet "Made in America". And that’s completely OK, because if everything were truly made in America you’d pay 3x the price and have 1/3 of the companies based in the U.S.A. Also, for me (and likely many others) I look for the best products at the most reasonable price that meets my needs. Ask yourself - do you only buy "U.S made" vehicles? I could care less if it was built on Mars, may the best company with the best products win (and btw, they won’t be "made" in any one country anyway).
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-Employee of Sutherland Engineering responding- There are a lot of great audio products on this list. Thanks for compiling. Sutherland phono pre-amps are as made in the USA as they can be. While many of the individual components are made over seas (resistors, op amps, capacitors, for example, come from Germany, France and Asia) the components are all hand assembled and soldered in the USA. All steel and aluminum metalwork and machining are also USA sourced. We don't have boards assembled overseas then assemble modules. |
Bang & Olufsen use Scanspeak drivers probably exclusively. Not a bad thing. Scanspeak is one of a handful of companies in the world specially equipped to make beryllium tweeters. I was once informed that Burmester sources it's AMTs from Elac and I know they also use Mundorf. Definitely not a bad thing. They also use Scanspeaks mid-range drivers for sure, and probably woofers as well. Very few speaker manufacturers in the world make all their own drivers. That said, usually outsourced drivers are heavily modified to bespoke specifications. |
Yes McIntosh makes some great gear but it's assembled in America.I worked there for 23 years so yes I know,despite their claims The mirrored stainless steel,China,capacitors,and all parts inside China power transformers Shumex'Shumacher moved production to Mexico as did Plitron bought out and made in China,everything made to spec in other Countries...... |
@jimijack , we’ll, it appears then tha McIntosh has gone to great lengths to perpetuate a lie then. I’ve seen videos of the stainless steel plate fabrication, autoformer manufacturing, soldering of circuit boards, and more, all done by Americans. Not to say capacitors may be from overseas, but to me it looks as if the majority of the value is done right there in Binghamton. What am I missing? |
@darkj Suggest you check out Legacy Audio loudspeakers (Illinois) and Schiit Audio (amps, DACS, equalizers) in CA with some production in TX. "Designed and built" in US; can't vouch for all parts. |
@googoogjoob What about them? Linear Tube Audio is listed, though it looks like they may have moved from DC to the suburbs. https://americanmadeaudio.com/product/linear-tube-audio/
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@coppy777 "Not a fan but what about Transparent audio, the cable folks." |
Nothing against Transparent, many love them. With Wilson speakers, always wanted to try their cables. I use Nordost Valhalla and the Transparent dealers seem reluctant to send me anything for comparison. I see Nordost is on the list. As is Conrad-Johnson. Been there and it's all done in Virginia. Thanks for compiling this information for us. |
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@skyscraper Devore is listed https://americanmadeaudio.com/the-list/ |
