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The original Spendor SA1 loudspeaker was released soon before the BBC LS3/5a in the early 1970s, and many people thought it sounded better than its more popular competitor. The SA1 you see here, on the other hand, is a distant cousin that has evolved much since then. Only the dimensions (305x165x190mm) and the usage of an infinite baffle cabinet design are similar, which are coincidentally the same as the LS3/5a but turned ninety degrees. This, the final model in the SA1 line, was released in the UK in 2009 for £1,100 and was widely available in a Zebrano finish.
The choice of an infinite baffle, according to Philip Swift of Spendor, was partially to maintain timing purity, but also to make it more usable as a little box – you could, for example, shove it right up against a back wall. It featured a new 150mm Spendor mid/bass unit with a magnesium alloy chassis, a sophisticated surround with huge excursion motor system, and the company’s preferred ep38 polymer cone material. A network of high-grade passive components and gold-plated conductors spanned across the matching 22mm wide-surround tweeter at 4.8kHz. Internal cables were single connected to WBT binding posts and were silver-plated copper with halogen-free dielectric.
The SA1 maintained Spendor’s thin-wall damped panel design in terms of structure, with the premise that big, bulky cabinet walls store energy and muddy the sound. The cabinets were tightly braced and built with three different panel thicknesses, reducing the cumulative influence of their different resonance frequencies. As a result, the 5.4kg cabinet has an odd feel to it; instead of a long-decaying ‘thunk,’ it seems more like a brief, abrupt ‘click’ when you hit it with your knuckles. Zebrano high gloss, classic jet black piano lacquer, and a rich deep brown satin wenge were among the veneers and lacquers available for the cabinet. For £400, matching 600m high platforms constructed of light wood (4.1kg) with matching veneer inlay were offered.