# Concord brand HU from the late '80s?



## final frontier

Was this an actual brand from back in the day?

No, I'm not going to currently use one :laugh:, but I seem to recall Concord was a brand I installed in the late 80s. I Googled it, but came up with nothing.

Can anyone verify that this was indeed a brand name?


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## imjustjason

Yes it was a brand. They had the best cassette section specs of all cassette units. There units were pretty high end. The HPL-550 claimed to have 20-20,000 FR on the cassette section.


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## final frontier

Cool. Wow, it did sound pretty good until I sold the car. The model I had was a bit more modern than your pic. Although, my initial Concord HU that was installed actually played cassettes too fast (bad servo?)...and the audio shop replaced it. It sure had a lot of amp controls that I know nothing about at the time (still don't - LOL)...but I could fiddle with them to get the most out of my JBL 6x9s.

Thanks, man!


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## Bayboy

Buddy of mine had one in a VW Rabbit running Pioneer coaxials and feeding a Punch 45. All passive crossovers including on the Pyle subs. Best sounding cassette I ever heard. Of course that may not mean much in the digital world today, but that thing was clean!


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## plato801

I have a Concord Hpl 550 and HPA-71 NOS.


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## plato801

I've listed them both on eBay

Concord HPL 550 stereo cassette deck and HPA 71 power amp.

cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300546091358&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Thanks
Plato


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## sqshoestring

Concord is a division of Harmon Kardon, some of the amps were identical and quite high end. I don't know if that was always the case or if they always owned them.


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## plato801

I had my HPL-520 and HPA-50 in my vechicles from 1985 through to 2002 (not joking). The sound was clean and bass was tight. The amp makes all the difference as impedence match with speakers and power handling comes into there own. 

Anyway the HPL-550 and HPA-71 have been listed on ebay yesterday. This is my last NOS car stereo. I have sold quite a few units three years ago and the majority sold went to the United States.

Unfortunately I can't load any pic as I don't have over 30 posts.

Cheers


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## tnbubba

the old concords were awesome units.. still sound dang good today.. too bad you cant aux in but I think the 550 had an aux input..I had on 502?? one of first radios that had a selector switch between tuner n tape.. It was a mid level unit and absolutely killed everything on tape playback. and the output section was clean..I used that HU for ions before I sold it. waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa


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## Mr. T

Hello?! Very sorry, this doesn't concern your post, but I am VERY new to this forum, and no one in Minnesota knows anything about car audio!

HOW DO I POST A THREAD? Do I go under "my threads" I don't see anywhere where it says "post thread" 

I would love to upgrade my DLS UP5i's with something that has a little more kick, but still maintain SQ. I was looking into heading Active with a set of Seas Mids, and Peerless tweets


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## plato801

The HPL-117 was the basic head unit


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## plato801

Concord HPA-51 Was a great 50watt per channel amp. I had the wiring change to some higher grade Tardas cable.


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## plato801

The HPL-520 and HPL-550 both have AUX.

Funny there were no digital Mp3's in the 90's only CD portables!


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## mattjk

Wow, this brings back memories! I used to own a few different Concord decks, amps, and even the DBX processor. Their DIN units didn't look great, but their older knob units looked awesome for back in the day with it's tiny aluminum rocker switches. Great stuff.

This is the only picture I could find on GIS.


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## chithead

Friend of mine at just brought in a HPA-51 amplifier. Pretty cool little old school amp.


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## stony22

I know of one of the amps for sale still at some stereo shop in Anahiem, not sure what model it was but its the ugly nicotine yellow colored ones, think it was 100 or so per channel. He wants $150 for it. That where I got the JBL M2 from.


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## sqshoestring

I had a high end kenwood with dolby c, k-wood HU were pretty good back then, and metal tapes off a Nakamichi home deck. It sounded really good, as good as a CD if the record was perfect enough. I never had any concord stuff back then they were scarce around here.


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## IndianScout

imo best car stereo's ever made..


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## tnbubba

hpl 502(1?) hpl 520 one of first decks with aux input and selectable tuner/tape/aux inputs.. hell of a cassette section..
old concord amps built like tank.. mostly discrete circuitry..
on par with nak!


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## analogrocker

I've always heard good things about Concord. Whatever happened to them? Did they ever produce a CD deck?

I'd give anything to travel back in time to experience the car audio world of the 1980s - early 1990s. So much awesome gear.


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## Catman

In the early to mid 80s CONCORD was some amazing gear. The only thing better was Nakamichi. Sometime in the 90s they 'sold out' and everything they made was on par with Jensen. I'm not totally sure of all of their evolution.


>^..^<


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## Andy Lake

In 1983 i bought a '76 honda civic 2 door for $2500. Much to my parents disgust, I then installed a Concord 550hu + 100w concord speakers & graphic eq for about the same price as the car! Everyone used to come and stick their head in my car to listen to INXS pumping out Johnson's Aeroplane- super loud, super clean. 
I eventually swapped the car (minus the stereo) for a bmw motorbike, & sold the stereo gear to my older brother for his xc falcon. Years later he sold it onto a mate of his. 
Without doubt, one of the very best you could get at the time. All these years later, i'm still a mad audio nut. ?


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## PPI_GUY

analogrocker said:


> I'd give anything to travel back in time to experience the car audio world of the 1980s - early 1990s. So much awesome gear.


It would be a double-edged sword. I got into car audio in the mid-late 80's and prices (compared to now) were incredibly high. The first two real amps I bought were two RF Punch 45's. Rated at 45 watts each @ 4 ohm load. They'd probably do 60-75 watts per channel at 2 ohms. Anyway, bought them from an authorized dealer and they cost me $279 each. So, close to $600 for 90 watts/240 watts max. 

Subs weren't that bad price wise. You could get gold-letter Kicker Comps for around $100 each. Solobarics would run you more, maybe $139. 

The fun side was in all the new gear that was always coming out. Sometimes it seemed a new model headunit or amp, sub would come out nearly every month. CD transports were awful back then but, the leap in SQ over cassettes was well worth the hassle. Most everything was run active back then. Basically because passive crossovers were lacking. Component drivers didn't handle the kind of power they can today. Heck, only the biggest systems ran the kind of power necessary to destroy a good driver of that time period anyway. 

It was a great time to be into car audio. The innovation in product design and system install was moving forward at a breakneck pace. IMHO, the 10 years from '85-'95 were just amazing. 
Concord was one of those brands you lusted over in the early days. Every issue of Crutchfield would come to my house and I would drool over the specs and features of headunits and amps, etc. Concord was one of their highest level lines and priced accordingly. Always remember their amps being kinda small and somewhat low powered though.


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## rob feature

analogrocker said:


> I've always heard good things about Concord. Whatever happened to them? Did they ever produce a CD deck?
> 
> I'd give anything to travel back in time to experience the car audio world of the 1980s - early 1990s. So much awesome gear.


Yeah, I owned one of their CD head units - forget the model, but I paid through the nose for it...like $700 in the mid 90s. Also had a CA 200.2. It was nice stuff, but I had Alpine and Nakamichi head units I liked as well if not more. I'm in the process of sorting through some pictures. Maybe I'll get lucky & run across some of that stuff.


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## audiobaun

In 1989, I placed a Concord Cassette HU in my 87 Accord along with 2- 50.2 amps That still worked excellent and just sold about a year ago, and I still have 2- 20.2s that still sound fantastic and in great shape.I ran the 400 that was the exact same version as the GTQ 400 that is when Harmon/JBL bought them out and later became the GTS/GTQ series amps.I should have kept that Concord 400 would have been pretty cool to place beside the last of 4 400 GTQs I have left..I have a Pretty Mint GTS 600 JBL that still sounds fantastic..That was one of my favorite HUs of all time..it was a knob version..dont remember the Model, but enjoyed the hell out of it ..went with Blaupa. HUs after that


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## rob feature

Found an old photo of it, but can't read the silkscreening 'cause of the flash. I do remember the whole unit pulled out as an 'anti-theft' device. It was a little unwieldy, but you could take it with ya if you just had to. If you didn't it was really easy to steal. 

Concord CD2 & MSI Monolithic Preamp. The cigarette lighter was also a removable valet switch. No lighter, no amps


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## Mikestereo

final frontier said:


> Was this an actual brand from back in the day?
> 
> No, I'm not going to currently use one :laugh:, but I seem to recall Concord was a brand I installed in the late 80s. I Googled it, but came up with nothing.
> 
> Can anyone verify that this was indeed a brand name?


I was the car stereo installer in Arizona in the late 80s
And yes Concord was a brand name. They were known for their tape section featuring the Blue sen-dust tape head, I was using the Concord 505 , I would love to get one today.


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## BLIII

Mikestereo said:


> I was the car stereo installer in Arizona in the late 80s
> And yes Concord was a brand name. They were none for their tape section featuring the Blue sen-dust tape head, I was using the Concord 505 , I would love to get one today.


I ran a car stereo shop up here in SW Washington. I have a 505 HPL 505Z. A friend gave it to me & I put in a Mazda GLC. I had a 50 mile round trip commute and that stereo made it nice. I was running a modest amp (Alphasonic?) and Boston Acoustics speakers, it sounded great in that car. I am certainly interested in selling it.


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## clange2485

rob feature said:


> Found an old photo of it, but can't read the silkscreening 'cause of the flash. I do remember the whole unit pulled out as an 'anti-theft' device. It was a little unwieldy, but you could take it with ya if you just had to. If you didn't it was really easy to steal.
> 
> Concord CD2 & MSI Monolithic Preamp. The cigarette lighter was also a removable valet switch. No lighter, no amps


I know this is super old but that valet switch is still awesome! The part about the sliding deck, maybe not best idea but this seems pre removable face plate so maybe they were onto something.


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## MythosDreamLab

My recollection was that before Concord there was Westport and I had the HP-100 and the HPA-40 in my car and later in a 78 Black Dodge Van w/Centerlines! They powered some thin (4" wide) BES Home speakers that I had mounted to the side walls and sound came out both sides!



















I have two Concord brochures, one shows the Cx Series, not sure of the year, but it does say they were owned by Harman International. The other is dated 1985 and says they were owned by Penril. This one has the HPL-550 in it, man it had killer tape specs...



















_(they are both for sale...)_


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## bbfoto

^Thanks for posting and sharing the brochures. I, too, had one of the Concord HPL Dual-Shaft cassette head units back in the day. Wore that thing out playing all of my custom mixtapes, LOL.


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## MythosDreamLab

bbfoto said:


> ^Thanks for posting and sharing the brochures. I, too, had one of the Concord HPL Dual-Shaft cassette head units back in the day. Wore that thing out playing all of my custom mixtapes, LOL.


Were you a Maxell or TDK guy?


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## bbfoto

MythosDreamLab said:


> Were you a Maxell or TDK guy?


More Maxell, but a mix of both with some Sony & BASF thrown in. 

Still have my Akai GX-95 MK-II 3-Head home cassette deck as well. Had it completely refurbished a few years back. Transferred a lot of my old school mix tapes to 320kbps CBR MP3, but need to dig out that HDD and organize those files.

Someone way back in this old thread mentioned playing *INXS*' "*Johnson's Aeroplane*" track on his Concord in-dash cassette head unit. I agree that it sounded absolutely incredible on cassette playing in the Concord, and I wore that cassette out playing it both in my car and at home as well. Bought the vinyl LP, too.

The track is from "*The Swing*" album, which was recorded extremely well, and IMO is a very under-rated and forgotten album.

Try to stream it or pick up the first CD release of it. Up until that album I had never experienced such "High-Fidelity" sound from a cassette.

Still one of my favorite albums from the era and genre, and luckily it has top notch SQ.


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## bbfoto

...in the 80's the Concord products were distributed by Westland International in Los Angeles. This was printed on the labels/stickers on top of each head unit with "Made in Japan" below it.


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## akitadog

I had the hpl-550 installed in my LUV truck back in late 80's. and a Sanyo pa100 amp. Loved that deck.
In fact still have mine in the garage. Dire Straights and Tina Turner rocked.


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## portritchey

final frontier said:


> Was this an actual brand from back in the day?
> 
> No, I'm not going to currently use one :laugh:, but I seem to recall Concord was a brand I installed in the late 80s. I Googled it, but came up with nothing.
> 
> Can anyone verify that this was indeed a brand name?


yes i owened one great unit


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## Dave A

Gotta say I put a HPL 101 and the HPA 50 100w amp with 6x9s into my 70 Torino Cobra jet shaker car in the mid 80s and it was awesome ! Now it resides in my 71 Torino Shaker rag, with Focal 7x10s.Sounds awesome, people think it is CD player, that clean ! Also have a mint HPL 118 going into my 71 Cobra jet Ranchero GT. Pretty sure the early stuff was made by Nakamichi ?


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