Grounding problem with a dedicated line?

I'm not a betting man, but...
Here's my prediction: putting the Jadis on the same line will not solve the hum problem.
(Not trying to be a buzzkill, it's just based on my suspicion of what's happening with your system and it isn't the differing ground potential among the lines).
Second speculation- (that Ralph or anybody else with tech chops is free to correct) - that Rowland is probably a hungry thing. I wonder if the Jadis suck much juice. My tube amps don't, really, but they are low powered (18 watts per).
Interested to find out what you report.
Bill

 

Good man!

I am actually not quite sure why you brought Rowland in to the mix at all. But your findings are interesting. I think the loss of volume is 100% attributed
to what ever you are using for power distribution. My personal opinion, and let me stress that it is just my opinion, a high quality PC that deliver consistent clean current to the system is essential for your set up. It will introduce a sense of ease to the system, at least that is my experience with multiple systems.

Report back on the Jadis...wonderful amps btw!

 

...buzzkill....good one!

I agree the Jadis will suck way less power out of the outlet...

 

To add to my last post, I am using a TG audio power distributor for the distribution. Also, a PC from Shunyata ( a Delta) for the ss amp. ( The amp requires a 20 amp iec.) I plugged the amp directly into the wall outlet and the power distributor into the other outlet of the dedicated line.
The preamp, SACD player and turntable are so far the only things going through the strip. Once I use the Jadis amps, they will also go through the strip. The Jadis puts out 45 watts/ch...so far less powerful than the Rowland, but they have very large transformers and caps. Perhaps even larger than the Rowland ss stereo amp!

 

Bill, I hope you are wrong about the differing ground potential, but we shall see. What is your guess/suspicion as to the issue?

 

For your next test with the Jadis amps connected, feed the SACD, preamp, and the Jadis amps, all from TG audio power distributor. This configuration will assure all equipment ground connections will be star grounded at the power distributor.


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If you connect the SACD, preamp, and the Jadis amps, all to TG audio power distributor I'm betting there will not be a buzz/hum.

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The chassis and signal ground combined. That's the issue that I think plagues the Lamm SET, at least the original model ML2. And what Ralph pointed to. But, I'm happy to be wrong.

 

That is what I am planning on doing next.

 

Makes one wonder what Vladimir was thinking with that set up?

 

When I suggested earlier using a long wire to touch each chassis(Jadis to Esoteric), you mentioned you tried it and it was still buzzing. My guess is by transferring all equipment to the same dedicated AC line would not make any difference as they are now all sharing the same ground point just like the long wire.

 

Doing as you suggested, running a ground wire from equipment chassis to equipment chassis, only provides a parallel path for the ground loop current to flow through the signal ground of the equipment chassis back to the source.

Equipment ground, convenience outlet branch circuit >> SACD player >> preamp >> Jadis amps >> equipment ground, dedicated branch circuit. A closed loop, circuit.
Inserting a ground cheater at either end of the loop will break the ground loop circuit.



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In fact this is exactly what happened. When I tried a ground cheater ( either on the amps or on the SACD player) the buzz went away. Not so with the ground wire from the equipment chassis to equipment chassis. Which is why i am hopeful that the problem will be eradicated when i use the Jadis amps and all the gear on the same dedicated circuit. Question is whether I will also experience a drop off in SQ??

 

Jim- I've never understood how external star-grounding schemes worked if the power cord grounds weren't lifted (not advocating that one do so). Perhaps all they are doing is tying the chassis grounds to one plane.
I gather that those fancy external boxes, like the Tripoint and Entreq do lower noise, but they can't break a ground loop. I had (and still have somewhere) an early cheaper entrant made by Granite Audio which I experimented with when I first got my horns in around 2006; it allows one to alter the impedance of various ground planes via switches tied to various groupings of plugs for the external grounding cables.
Depending on switch position and which equipment is hooked up to different groupings of grounding cables, you can alter the overall system "noise" a little bit, but it wasn't really significant on my system (which is extremely high in efficiency at 104db/meter, making any inter-component electrical noise or gremlins pretty obvious).
Perhaps the fancier ones, which add some noise reducing compounds in the box do more -- I know there are some fierce advocates for these types of devices and I don't dismiss them out of hand given that I have not used one.
But is that what they are doing in theory- putting all the chassis grounds on the same plane? (excuse any incorrect terminology on my part). And if so, how do they ameliorate the noise if the equipment is still grounded via the power cord, i.e., not lifting the ground at the power plug or receptacle. More curiosity than anything but since it seemed to dovetail with your comments, I thought I'd ask....
Apologies - Davey this is not directly related to your issue.

 

Bill

In Dave's situation I'm just trying to keep all the safety equipment grounded audio equipment, that is connected together by wire interconnects, to connect to the common grounding conductor inside the TG audio power distributor. We don't know how long or the type of wiring scheme/design that was used for the power cord of the power distributor.

I didn't want Dave to plug one of the Jadis amps or the SACD into the wall outlet and the rest of the equipment into the power distributor. I am just trying to level the equipment grounding playing field, so to speak.

Jim


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Jim, I am going to be trying the set up with all components on the TG audio strip, as you suggest. I do have a couple of questions though..one, I once heard that the most power hungry components should be plugged in closest to the power cord of the strip, do you agree with this? Two, is it possible that the mono blocks will be getting less juice from the strip, than if I had them plugged directly into the outlet at the dedicated line...assuming I could do that, which I cannot at the moment as I only have a two gang outlet. Perhaps it would make some sense to have an electrician change the two gang outlet to a four gang outlet at the dedicated line...then plug the mono blocks into the wall and the power strip into the third gang.( or maybe the power strip into the third gang, and the preamp (which I think needs more current than the upstream gear) into the fourth gang. Thoughts?

 

I just thought of another variable. I use two (2) powered subwoofers. The REL’s take their signal from the amp speaker ends and are a balanced design. I have one sub connected to each monoblock speaker output. Would this connection interfere with the grounding scenario once I plug all of the gear into the strip? I don’t plug the subs into the same outlet as the main gear...iOW they are not going to be on the dedicated line. Since they are downstream of the amp, I would expect them to be irrelevant to the grounding, is this correct?

 

Davey- I am not Jim (obviously) and would defer to @jea48 's knowledge (since he knows a whole lot more about electrical systems than me) but on the question of ganging and sequence, I think for present purposes, your goal is simply to have everything hooked up through the same receptacle using a distribution strip to see if that affects the grounding hum. I think you could do that even if the amps aren't getting all the power they might through a better arrangement (@Ralph Karsten?) before you pull an electrician into the game.
As to the subs, if you think the issue is grounding potential differences due to different lines, I would think those would need to get their AC power from the same source (or simply disconnect them temporarily for the purpose of testing).
Interested to see if the real experts differ. Call me an enthusiast. (And a piker when it comes to electrical and circuits- I know what I know only because I've had issues over the years). Good luck,
Bill

 

The subs appear to not be the variable. Installation of the Rowland solved the buzz. The subs were in play at that time. When you had the Jadis in the system, disconnection of the Esoteric solved the buzz. Again, the subs were in the system per your comments. So it can be deduced that the subs have nothing to do with the buzz- and the latter has everything to do with both the Jadis and the Esoteric being in the system at the same time.

I see the dedicated line as a Red Herring. If correct then the buzz will return when the Jadis and the Esoteric are in the system and the AC line really won't make much difference. This being the internet, these things have to be tested before someone can be believed

 

Ralph, all that you stated makes sense. Certainly the subs were in the system with the Jadis and the Rowland. I am hoping that the all on one line option will correct the issue, as it is very unfortunate if the Jadis and the Esoteric cannot be made to play nice together. Well, unless I add the Jensen transformer, as you suggest. Why do you think that a ground loop caused by an imbalance of the voltage between the two circuits cannot be a factor? I am curious about this, as you seem 100% certain. ( and yet an electrical engineer friend seemed to believe that was a very possible cause of the issue) ( BTW, I am not saying you are wrong, as i haven't tried this yet...too many other work related issues to address first.)

 

Your engineer friend IMO is not applying logic in this case.

Electrical wiring in the wall doesn't cause a ground loop (and referring to it as an 'imbalance of the voltage between the two circuits' is wildly incorrect); it only allows it if improperly grounded audio equipment is hooked up. In this case, we know that the Jadis has an internal audio circuit ground which is the same as the chassis, and that the chassis is grounded via the AC power cord. This is a poor practice (makes it ground loop susceptible, although the chassis should be grounded for safety)- I've explained earlier on this thread how the amps should have been set up. IOW the AC wiring can be perfect and you'll still get the ground loop because the amps are the problem, not the wiring.

And like I've mentioned several times, it takes two to tango. Obviously Ken knows what he's doing so the CAT doesn't have ground loop problems. But add something that does- the Teac- and now you've got a problem. The AC wiring is simply doing its job; its not the AC wiring's fault if someone doesn't know what they are doing and designs a product susceptible to ground loops.

Now you don't have to use Jensens. You could simply get either the amps or the Esoteric fixed (you don't have to fix both). I'm thinking right now that the Esoteric is easier to fix; its easier to ship and there's only one of them. IIRC, the Esoteric has balanced and single-ended outputs and that might be the reason you're having this problem. Teac as Tascam makes mixers and recorders and they know damn well that in a balanced application that ground is going to be ignored (and so normally is tied to chassis). But when you add RCA outputs into the mix, you have to ground them and chassis ground is about the only place to do that if they built their balanced outputs properly. IMO Teac might have added the RCA outputs as an afterthought and didn't take into account that since their product was also balanced that there might be a problem

 

Ralph, thanks again One more question, the Esoteric has a ground connect post that is labeled for signal ground on the rear panel. I noticed that all of their players have the same ground post. What is this supposed to do? I have not hooked it up to anything, and yet perhaps this is there for a very good reason?

 

Tonight, everything on the dedicated line( all on the TG audio power strip). The Jadis and the Esoteric played beautifully together....buzz has been killed!

To Jim and the others, thank you for suggesting this solution. Ralph, appreciate all your assistance too, but the all on one dedicated circuit did the trick.

 

I'm glad you solved it.
My speculation about the grounding problem in the Jadis being the primary cause was wrong. So, will you be able to live with the system as presently configured? I'm also wondering, since you spoke about a 'convenience outlet' in your original hook-up- I assumed that meant it was not a dedicated line. So, I guess the question to me is whether it is possible to run dedicated lines (which i have several of in my room) that can be wired in such a way to eliminate grounding potential differences? I know the one receptacle/distribution block approach (which I always thought of as the 'British' approach because they didn't necessary go in for massive solid state amps) is ideal, but what if you want/need more juice for that Rowland?
In any case, I'm glad you got it sorted.

 

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