Haden Boardman explores the extraordinary history of one of the first truely high-fidelity tonearms.

There has been but a handful of truly original products in audio, items so advanced or so different they are in a class of their own. The Quad ESL 57, the first commercial electrostatic, is one of the easiest to put in this class. Voigt's original 1933 corner horn loudspeaker might not seem such an obvious one, nor Decca's Decola and its FFRR Full Frequency Range Recording system (the world's first complete high-fidelity system) but pivotal products they were.

At first glance, even less likely to be included in this group is the Alphason HR100S tone-arm, but let's consider the situation back in the late Seventies. What choice in high-end tone-arms was there? The Grace 707? Nice bearings, but nasty, cheap plastic head-shell. SME Series III? Ultra-low mass but a little uncomfortable with heavier cartridges. The Hadcock unipivot and the odd Japanese import (Audio Technica, Fidelity Research, Micro, etc) just about completes the list - in short, not a lot!

The HR100S is a most unusual arm. An ultra-strong, one-piece titanium casting forms the arm-tube and head shell; tool-grade steel is used for the gimbal-bearing housing and ultra-tough ceramic for the bearings themselves. The titanium arm-tube is lined with an absorbent foam, and is shaped in an 'S' instead of the more usual 'J' shape. This gives a stronger design since it allows more rigiditv in the arm/head-shell area. Although most certainly not the world's first one piece arm (look at those pretty bakelite things fitted to 1930s radiograms!) it was the first such arm which could be considered truly high-fidelity. 
 

The HR100S's inventor, Mike Knowles, was a top-flight gauge engineer by trade, and had an eye for quality and an ear for sound. He actually started making these beautiful tone-arms in his garage at home! This is well beyond what most of us mere mortals are capable of, considering that titanium is next to impossible to cut and requires the pressure of a 35 ton press just to put a kink in it. At hi-fi shows, Alphason would offer a free turntable and arm to anybody who could bend the arm-tube. Needless to say, despite the efforts of some very heavyweight bodybuilders, nobody managed to win the prize. 

The arm is a work of art and something of a bargain. It is elegant, simple and it works. As regards sound, it is very, very neutral as you would expect. Its clarity and transparency come from a minimum of (carefully-controlled) resonances, the first of which starts at around 1 kHz. For a medium-mass arm like this, I would recommend cartridges of 8gms-15gms as being most suitable, specifically something like an Ortofon Rohmann. 

Back in 1980 the HR100S sold for a pitiful £100. Alright, Mike was making them in his garage, but how could anyone consider this the world's finest arm when it cost a 'ton' - even an early Ittok was double that! The arm was finally discontinued in 1993, when the retail price was around £500 complete with monocrystal silver wiring.

Talk about underpricing! The manufacturer's view was that, if the price was kept low, it would enhance its enthusiast appeal and consequently sell more easily. This, sadly, just does not
happen. If a manufacturer does not make enough money on a product, how can he afford to tell the world about it?

For all that, Mike Knowles shifted a lot of arms. His dedicated family helped out, and a whole range of products was built up. Other arms included the Opal, Delta and Xenon. All were impressive, but none on a par with the HR100S.

In 1986 the Sonata, a sophisticated suspended turntable, was launched. Its chassis was made from drop-cast pig-iron hanging from long, adjustable, damped springs in little suspension turrets. An acrylic platter, twin motors, adjustable feet and (gasp!) a decently solid plinth rounded out the package. Again, this wonder product was very much underpriced and, despite several rave reviews, it never really stood much of a chance against the onslaught of CD. All the original models had proper electronic power supplies, but it wasn't until two years later that the superb ATLAS power supply arrived.

This PSU digitally generated the drive waveform at the requisite frequency, amplified it and applied it to the twin motors. It was built so that fussy, pitch-sensitive clients could adjust the speed of their records slightly, but the difference it made to the sound was amazing. Naturally, other manufacturers took note, and similar devices rapidly began to appear.

This wasn't the first time poor old Mike had suffered from imitation being the sincerest form of flattery. Another manufacturer had approached Alphason with the idea of tying the two companies up together. This opportunity came about largely as a result of the ground-breaking HR100S. After a round of visits and discussions, the deal came to nothing, but in the process Mike had naturally shown how the HR100S was made. Nothing further was heard until the launch by the other manufacturer of a one-piece arm, which has since had a long and successful life.

Another nightmare was the electronics. To complete his range, Mike looked at making amplifiers and loudspeakers as well. The amplifiers were a total disaster. A pre/power combination cooked
up by an 'expert' for tens of thousands of pounds would go into complete melt down at the very slightest provocation. This was not just the power amp, but some of the early pre-amps as well!

The 'speakers were more successful, Mike putting some of his own ideas into a unique version of the well-known Tonigen ribbon tweeter. A diaphragm was developed that could survive running at temperatures in excess of 200°C (most tweeters fry once they get near 70°C). In addition to this, the unit was designed with a mechanical roll-off that side-stepped the need for a crossover. The bass unit was a TPX cone, with a simple inductor fitted to limit its high-frequency response. And under the name Sonata, two turntables were launched, the successful Solo and the not-so-successful Apollo.

The complete Alphason system sounded great, but Mike's interest had waned. To rub salt into his wounds, at the time of the electronics problems, a representative was going around telling everyone that Alphason were in dire straights when this was simply not true.

On top of this, an enthusiastic customer, thinking he was doing Alphason a favour, would badger local dealers into getting the Sonata in stock by ringing up and posing as a potential customer.
Unhappily, the gentleman had a pretty distinctive accent and would also accompany Mike on dealer demonstrations! Dealers aren't stupid and spotted the 'plant' even though Alphason were completely in ignorance of his activities!

Thanks to this mis-directed enthusiasm, Alphason began to lose what dealers it had and was forced to sell 'factory seconds' direct to customers. This way, you soon end up with no dealers at all.

Between 1980 and 1990, Alphason had its (unfortunately unpatented) ideas copied by other manufacturers, was ripped off for dodgy amplifiers, bad-mouthed by an ex-employee and suffered an enthusiast muddying the water with the dealers. Oh, and did I mention the peeling veneer problem on early Sonatas, which forced Mike to open his own cabinet shop?

Nobody said making hi-fi was easy, but the odds seem to have been well and truly stacked against Mike. His current range of hi-fi furniture has been a market leader for the past nine years or so, but what about the hi-fi itself? The last product to be launched was the Symphony, basically a luxury Sonata, which was a sort of swan song.

All of Alphason's components (bar the amps, of course) are good second-hand buys, especially the Sonata/Symphony and the loudspeakers. But it is the HR100S tone-arm that remains virtually untouched as a high-end bargain. It suits most expensive MC cartridges very well, offering a lucid, controlled sound quality. Beware though: Alphason has no spare parts for these units; luckily, they don't tend to need them, but avoid any arm that has bits missing. Pay between £250 and £350 (depending on age, and whether the wiring is MCS silver) and simply enjoy the music