We set off very early to arrive at the Rega factory near Southend at 8.30 am! It's a modern purpose-built factory, very different from the old converted mill they inhabited when I first visited over 30 years ago.
Although built by Rega in the early 90s there was forethought in the design allowing for the addition of 2 mezzanine floor levels to triple the floorspace
As I visited a space was being prepared for another mezzanine to further expand cartridge production.
That's because Rega are surfing the crest of a huge wave of interest not only in turntables but also in handmade performance products. Wouldn't you rather have your hifi made by real people who care about sound than a machine in China?
Its quite an operation now too, with 105 people now working at Rega in several teams. The Planar1 is their volume turntable seller at £ 248 complete with arm and cartridge and it has it's own dedicated team. Other teams make tonearms, cartridges, electronics, wiring sub-assemblies, loudspeakers, and higher level turntables.
It is a very efficient operation with 26,000 sft split into separate production areas.
After a full day talking to every department, and even trying my hand at adjusting RB1000 tonearm bearings, not easy, we settled down for a listen to a very good system with the Rega RS10 speakers.
These are very underrated and can really sing, especially as part of Rega's Reference system with the RP10 turntable and Isis/Osiris cd and amplifier.
So how do you top that?
Easy, go to Roy Gandy's house. he is the founder and still the head designer at Rega. The listening area at his home is part living room, part demo room, part R&D room with all kinds of Rega products in some never before seen guises.
We listened to the Rega NAIAD turntable, £30,000, feeding an IOS phono stage, £ 3998, into the Osiris amplifier, £ 6125, into speakers that resembled the £ 7100 RS10s but were heavily modified. This is not for a production model but instead as an R&D tool testing small modifications to move forward the performance of Rega speakers generally.
So how does £ 47,000 sound?
Pretty amazing! Shame the turntable was a limited edition now sold out, although the RP10 with the new Aphelion moving coil cartridge is the next best thing and the system will 'only' be £ 22700 for the system
I was going to upload lots of poorly taken photos from my trip however there is now a much better option
Take the Rega Factory Tour by clicking this link, enjoy