Grundig TK-830
A deluxe German portable that Grundig's own service department remembered for the jelly babies found inside it.
Overview
The TK-830 came into America through Majestic International Sales of Chicago. They imported the West German portable and priced it at $419.95 - a lot of money for a domestic tape machine of the period. Tape Recording (March 1958, p.6) announced it in its new-products pages. The description that ran next to the price shows what Grundig was selling: a deck loaded with refinements, not a stripped-down transport.
The feature list covers just about everything a home recordist of the late fifties could want. There are three 5½ x 7-inch elliptical permanent-magnet loudspeakers, an 8-watt output stage, and a Magic Eye recording-level indicator. Three separate visual indicators cover bass, medium and treble. A precision tape counter doubles as a program indexer. Tape speeds are 3¾ and 7½ ips, with dual-track operation and fast wind and rewind in either direction. Grundig quoted frequency response at 50 to 16,000 cps. That figure belongs to the 7½ ips setting, and it is a manufacturer's claim, not a measured result.
The /3D variant used the same chassis but added a feature Grundig made much of in its British advertising: superimposition. Press a button and a new recording is laid over an existing one without erasing it. The same advertisement lists a socket for a Grundig distributor speaker and another for the Grundig remote control unit, three independent microphone, radio and telephone switches, and separate recording-level and volume controls. Grundig's own copy billed the /3D as standing "supreme in the tape recorder field". That is marketing language, not a verdict, but it shows where the company placed the machine in its lineup.
The Grundig Gazette, relayed by Studio-Sound (September 1965, p.15), gives a good picture of how these decks were used. A five-year-old TK 830 came in for overhaul and went home in time for Christmas. It returned weeks later with a bitter complaint that it had failed at a New Year's Eve party. The service department lifted the top deck in the owner's presence and pulled out several ounces of mangled jelly babies, posted through the ventilation slots by his young son.
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