I was looking for something else and Beltek popped up as a supplier to CRAIG (USA) shipping them 30,000 car stereos a month in 1975. A little research and I found this beauty. What a beautiful little recorder, anybody know more about this? It looks like Beltek was known for car stereos with some looking better than most but I've found a handful of portables branded with Beltek.
That’s one beautiful machine. I had a late 1970’s Craig portable cassette recorder that clearly shares some of the industrial design with this unit. The Craig isn’t nearly as nice but many similar design ques.
CRAIG had a huge market and name credibility back then but the more I find out the more it seems like most of their stuff was rebadged. For years the internet lore was they were mostly Sanyo. I remember them for car stereos and CB's in the 70's are part way into the 80's. I'm sure some of these companies bought off-the-shelf equipment but they also wanted some in-house designs after the money started rolling in. We need one of the youtubers to do a deep dive, hopefully not the AI version.
Beltek seemed to be around for a long time. This mid 1990s car stereo is labelled "for Nissan" on the front but the sticker on the bottom says Beltek. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/257358500949 As for Craig I have never seen one in the U.K. By the time the CB craze hit the U.K. in 1981 the big three manufacturers were Cybernet, Uniden, and Midland. There was lots of badge engineering going on especially with the Cybernet e.g. with Rotel and Harrier rigs but it was fairly obvious that Cybernet had manufactured them.
I found a little blurb that said Beltek dabbled in branded audio but was better at making equipment for other companies. I've found at least two boomboxes now that look more 80's. It looks like they are still around and they were also one of the first car stereo manufacturers in 1966 with 8-track and cassette. They are now know as Die Cock! http://www.diecock.com/
They also made all-in-ones? You can see see some rebrands in the design, the dial looks like the short-lived Zenith Recievers.
