Wharfedale Teesdale

From when Gilbert A. Briggs still was at the helm of Wharfedale, less than ten years after the 1958 sale of the latter to the ubiquitous RANK organization.

Rank however waited for Briggs to retire in 1965 to change the name of its subsidiary : from
Wharfedale Wireless Works Ltd. to
RANK Wharfedale Wireless Works Ltd..
Such politesse and good manners aren't seen too often nowadays !

The Teesdale is an attempt at omni-directionality : the mid and high drivers inside the enclosure radiate toward the top, with cutouts on the sides of the enclosure and cone defelctors to let sound go "everywhere".

The big 38cm bass driver has a "roll surround" suspension (not Flexiprene) made with a more traditional (and safer) impregnated cloth.
The polepiece is 5cm in size, magnet is Ceramic, frame is cast and resonance low at 23...28 cycles/second.

The medium has an aluminium voice coil and cloth surround ; the tweeter too, sans aluminium voice coil.

The 5-element crossover crosses over at 800Hz and 3Khz and allows balance controls (volume) for the mid and tweeter drivers.

Enclosure designed with the co-operation of Consultant Designer Robert Gutmann F.S.I.A..


The Teesdale also saw later versions, one of which was "shared" by Leak in the late 1970s : Teesdale SP2 > Leak 3090.
A completely different design than the original mid 1960s Teesdale - why change a good name ?



A thread about the Teesdale's later SP2 version here.
And a detailed history of Wharfedale at... Wharfedale's.