About Grounding
Grounding is a key component of any electrical installation. If for any reason else, a proper ground will route a lightning strike away from electrical components in your home and safely to earth. If for no other reason, you want an optimum ground to protect your assets.
Grounding is a misunderstood concept. Many people think a good ground is a way to shunt noise to earth. I have heard a well grounded system lend a sense of calm and ease to a room, a felt presence. I have also heard a well grounded system allow much better integration of bass and mid/high drivers. But is it the ground rod in the yard doing the heavy lifting, or is it the way the ground system throughout the entire electrical infrastructure is applied. I find it more the later. Don’t get me wrong, a good ground to earth of less than 5 ohms is critical. But controlling the voltage potential between grounds throughout the system is critical to a noise mitigation.
From Bill Whitlock:
A Real-World Example. Assume 25-foot, foil-shield cable with #26 AWG drain wire. R = 1 Ω. Assume leakage current between 2-prong (ungrounded) devices is 316 μA. Noise voltage = 316 μV. Consumer reference = 316 mV. S/N ratio = 316 mV/316 μV = only 60 dB. Belden #8241F cable, shield R = 0.065 Ω, would improve S/N by some 24 dB!
From Bad to Worse ...When devices are grounded, often via other system cables, noise can become EXTREME! When ground voltage difference of only 30 mV between outlets is impressed across length of cable, resulting S/N becomes only 20 dB. Huge problem in home theater systems having multiple ground connections – sub-woofers and projectors with 3-prong plugs, CATV, and satellite TV connections.
What does all this mean. It means the relationship between ground, neutral, feeders and branch circuits is critical. It means the selection of conductors and how they are installed is critical. It means your fighting noise throughout the entire chain of power. For me it means hyper attention to detail when it comes to how you install conductors. It means one ground with all sources referenced to it, and only it. It means all paths back to the ground source need to be neat, strait, unbroken, uninterrupted, direct and applied in a star configuration. The best system you can build is based upon 1 branch circuit, 1 receptacle.
L-Shaped Model
Why
Over the years I have read white papers. I have spoken with fellow audiophile. I have spoken with well respected industry professionals. I have demoed many types of power conditioners and isolation transformers. But most important, I have applied a wide variety of techniques to ground homes. I have applied a wide variety of techniques to bring branch circuit power to the rack. I have tried many types of conductors and raceways.
Lynconite II Backfill Material
Improves ground system performance
Not only did conductors and wiring impact playback, the impact the rest of the home had on playback became apparent. The stories of dimmers, computers, motors and other household appliances affecting audio are real. But the way people handle these challenges is many times less than ideal. Many times people ignore the actual issue and try and address it with some sort of power conditioner that is supposed to magically correct the distorted waveform. My experience says this is the wrong way to go. Why spend $5 to $7K to apply a band aid to the problems, when for the same money, you could just correct the problem.
I have a check list of over 100 items that need to be investigated at every project. Hidden issues can lie all over your home. Fixing issues not only improves audio playback. It averts a future failure and mitigates potential fire hazards. Correcting issues and plugging directly into the wall is many times the best way to power your audio.
There are some conditioners or filters that can improve playback. For the most part it’s a case by case basis on what works.