[gooberdude]

hey all,

In the last week i've implemented a worthwhile tweak, but i'm perplexed as to why this works - grounding the stereo rack.   This has removed a layer of hash, grain and HF shrillness that I didn't know existed.   its simple to A-B test and the effects are audible.

My rack is a Lovan Classic I...its cheap & is 4 separate hollow metal tube frames (filled w/BB's) w/thin MDF shelves.  Each indiv shelf has 3 spikes which fit into the end caps of the shelf below.

I tried this a month or so ago, but didn't realize that the end caps were plastic & that there was no metal-to-metal contact betw shelves. i had a thin copper wire going from one shelf to the earth lug on the phono preamp but heard no improvement.  So, i cut up 4" long pieces of the same ground wire, made some bare ends & taped them from shelf to shelf.  I then attached a long wire to metal on the bottom shelf & connected the other bare end to the phono preamps earth lug & POOF!   I have not scraped any paint away to get to bare metal, just duct taped bare copper wire ends to the metal poles on the rack - took 5 minutes.

What i'm left with is a sweet silence that's never been there before...nothing but music now.  Voices are scary real, tv is not high pitched, cd's are sublime.   laugh tracks on sitcoms sound real, individual hands rather than a rush of high pitched clanging...   the digi cable tv box now puts out 3-D imagery similar to the cdp.   

This is an easy tweak to A-B test...since its plugged into the earth lug of the phono preamp, I can test by listening to CD's and then unplugging the phono preamp.  or i could simply pull the ground wire from the rack, its just taped on.      what is going on here?    The audible change is a lot like back in the day when we all had tape players with Dolby NR.    Its like turning Dolby on & off - except there's no loss of info with the grounded rack.

I also grounded my TV's rack which is another cheap Lovan made from hollow metal tubing & mdf.  I can't tell any difference in picture quality on the 32" CRT tv, but as stated earlier the cable box improved big time and XBOX sounds amazing too.

WHY DOES THIS WORK? 

Have others tried this?

I have a lot of cryo'd CAT5 wire left over from DIY sp cable projects...so i unravelled a length of it, removed the outer jacket & unbraided one pair of wires.   i'm using one tiny CAT5 wire as the ground wire.

My home has poured concrete floors, 1/2" nylon carpet padding and 1/2" pile nylon carpet.  The stereo rack is spiked to the floor, the TV rack is not.

Now there are 3 pieces of gear connected to the VPP-1 earth lug:  tt, Dustbug & rack ground.   Does anyone see issues with this?     The tv ground wire is attached to the ground inlet of a wall outlet on another circuit.

any thoughts and criticisms are welcome.    I posted in this forum to see if folks knew why this helps, not to pimp the tweak of the week.   I got this idea from earlier posts about grounding mid & woof driver baskets...im definitely trying those next!

bear in mind that my amp is not on a rack, it sits on a maple platform spiked to the floor.  So, only sources & the TVC are on racks that are grounded.   Also, inbetween the mdf shelves and the metal shelf frame is a double layer of blue spongy shelf paper...to keep floorborne vibes from going into the components.  Plus, all my gear sits on either brass or maple block footers and no cabling touches the metal of the shelves either.


GD

[Dan Banquer]

Explaining grounding to consumers is at best a tough issue. Explaining that consumer audio has no standards to speak of in this area is just as tough. However I will make an attempt which will probably be most unsatisfactory.
What you have probably done is given your system a very low impedance ground connection to earth that is done at the individual unit enclosures with one connection to earth. This appears to be another variation of the good old center point earth ground grounding technique.
For additional information on this please do a search in this forum for a post titled "Grounding Practices in Consumer Audio". You may also wish to pick up texts from distinguished experts in the area of grounding such as Henry Ott, and Ralph Morrison. I have the text from Henry Ott titled Reducing Noise in Electronic Equipment. It cost me $110.00 and it's worth every penny.
Just as a suggestion: try removing some of your designer cables and replacing them with stock cables; I would fully expect that many of the differences you heard earlier may well disappear.
                d.b.

[gooberdude]

thanks for the info Dan.

How would inserting stock cabling would make the benefits i've experienced disappear?

my sytem would be painful to listen to with stock cables - not sure if that's due to grounding though!   

now that i've thought about my orig post, the statement that its like turning Dolby NR on and off is accurate.   there is a small amount of hash & hshhhhhhhhhh & brightness that disappears completely when the racks are grounded.     

 
GD

[Dan Banquer]

What most audiophiles don't realize is that bad grounding is the cause of most of the anomalies that you have already described:

"now that i've thought about my orig post, the statement that its like turning Dolby NR on and off is accurate.   there is a small amount of hash & hshhhhhhhhhh & brightness that disappears completely when the racks are grounded."

Think about the ramifications of what you have just said and observed in your system. Once you have absorbed that, then try the experients of going back to stock cables and observe what happens.
               d.b.

[rajacat]

What most audiophiles don't realize is that bad grounding is the cause of most of the anomalies that you have already described:

"now that i've thought about my orig post, the statement that its like turning Dolby NR on and off is accurate.   there is a small amount of hash & hshhhhhhhhhh & brightness that disappears completely when the racks are grounded."

Think about the ramifications of what you have just said and observed in your system. Once you have absorbed that, then try the experients of going back to stock cables and observe what happens.
               d.b.

Back to stock cables? Isn't that a rather broad statement given you don't know what kind or how   his stock cables are made?  I noticed that you sell cables on your website. What happens when these cables are substituted for stock cables in a system?

[Occam]

Back to stock cables? Isn't that a rather broad statement given you don't know what kind or how   his stock cables are made?  I noticed that you sell cables on your website. What happens when these cables are substituted for stock cables in a system?

Dan has allways tended to broad (and oftimes accurate) statements.
Dan's cables would probably drop the noisefloor further, 'specially iff'n the ground leg of your cables are some panty ass guage.....

I guess you didn't do that search that Dan suggested?

[Dan Banquer]

Back to stock cables? Isn't that a rather broad statement given you don't know what kind or how   his stock cables are made?  I noticed that you sell cables on your website. What happens when these cables are substituted for stock cables in a system?

Dan has allways tended to broad (and oftimes accurate) statements.
Dan's cables would probably drop the noisefloor further, 'specially iff'n the ground leg of your cables are some panty ass guage.....

I guess you didn't do that search that Dan suggested?

I think we should also mention that I stopped manufacturing in January of 2006 and this is also noted on the main page of the website.
           d.b.

[gooberdude]

DB,

Your info in the thread back in April is great...tonight i'll check out the audioholics articles - i'd never been that site.   most of that is so over my head!

I don't have any stock IC's, just a few stock PC's, so i'm gonna leave my set-up as is & take your word for it.

One thing:  in no way have i experienced any hum or noises that i'd associate with a ground loop issue...i have heard those before so i'm familiar but my rig  doesn't hummm - unless one RCA plug wasn't on a jack properly or something. I plug all gear into a BPT PPC power strip so there's only 1 - 3 prong plug on the circuit...the PPC's 3 prong.

the noise i hear, or rather don't hear now, is a REALLY low level hshhhhhhhhhh sound like snow on a tv set - but not as severe.    its impossible to hear the noise until it disappears when the rack is grounded.   Its not as if the sound was bad & i made it better....the sound was fantastic.  grounding the rack takes it to a level i didn't think was possible without much more expensive gear.

it is the effect that folks who describe single ended vs balanced IC's mention...no noise, just dynamics.

when i 1st heard the effect, my cable box was playing through the speakers but the tv wasn't on (TVC burn-in) and a sitcom was on.   When no grounding was employed, the sound was a bit 2-D and all the sounds were coming from the center betw the speakers.   Immediately after connecting the ground all the tv voices became real, and the people were in a place on a stage, not in the center. i can hear footsteps on tv....   i think the show was Everybody Loves Raymond, and his wife's voice sounded like it was coming from inside a soda can before the grounding, now its real    i mentioned laugh tracks  like she's in the room.   i mentioned laughtracks earlier - before they were obnoxious to listen to.   now you can hear the difference between them and discern males & females and indiv claps. 

the sound is sweet, clear and forceful...the most unfatiguing i've experienced.

DB - Do you see any issues with connecting the rack ground to the phono preamp since 2 other things are attached to that earth lug?     
I could attach the rack's ground to the wall outlet that the tv rack is grounded to, which is on another circuit...the rack's ground cable would be about 7' whereas now its 12" though.

And, can i take this experiment to the next level...and what would that entail?
Has anyone tried grounding mid & woofer baskets??


GD

[Dan Banquer]

Since you are reporting success I think it's best if we proceed along the lines of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".
However, instead of the thin copper wire you are presently using as your main ground wire I would recommend a 3/8 inch flat braid for three reasons.
1. Current capability: if anything wrong happens a 3/8 inch flat braid is rated for about 30 amps if I remember correctly.
2. Braid is mostly capacitive and this will mean a lower impedance at high frequencies, and therefore it should be better for shunting unwanted RFI/EMI to earth. 
3. Outside of audio in the big bad world of electronics, flat braid is the choice for most applications.
Try the stock power cords, if you can get your hands on some Interconnects with a "robust" ground such as coax or a twisted pair with a ground shield all the better. If you decide to try this do ALL the interconnect cables at once. The same for the power cords.
               Have fun;
                      d.b.
P.S. Nothing like good grounding to reduce interference, and it also appears to that you just might be realizing just how much information is really on your source material.

[gooberdude]

Thanks DB!

Can i get 3/8 flat braid at Radio Shack?  i'm not familiar with it.
and is it 3/8" flat braid?    it makes perfect sense to beef up the cable to accept a hgiher voltage.

Also, should i substitute the 3/8 for all the ground wires, meaning the 4" long ones that connect the shelves together...or just for the long runs that plug into the earth lug (or ground in an outlet)?

last, since what i'm putting into the ground is EMI/RFI garbage, should i try and plug all the wires onto a difft circuit?   All this would change is the longest run of my rack's ground wire from 12" to about 7'.

GD

[Dan Banquer]

"Can i get 3/8 flat braid at Radio Shack?  i'm not familiar with it.
and is it 3/8" flat braid?    it makes perfect sense to beef up the cable to accept a hgiher voltage"
I doubt it, try google for vendors

"Also, should i substitute the 3/8 for all the ground wires, meaning the 4" long ones that connect the shelves together...or just for the long runs that plug into the earth lug (or ground in an outlet)?"
Yes, all the runs.

"last, since what i'm putting into the ground is EMI/RFI garbage, should i try and plug all the wires onto a difft circuit?   All this would change is the longest run of my rack's ground wire from 12" to about 7'."

I really wouldn't worry about this. I guess it's a young guy thing to worry about the difference between 7" and 12" 
          d.b.

[mgalusha]

RE: Flat Braid...

These folks have it for a reasonable price - if you could get them to cut it to length that is. http://www.worldwidewire.com/html/swc-bc-f-t.html

I have some short pieces you can have if you want them. PM me if you're interested. You can have them for the cost of shipping, assuming my cut offs will work for you.

[Dan Banquer]

Yo Mike: Is that stuff tinned?
             d.b.

[mgalusha]

I don't know, you would have to ask them. If you mean the stuff I offered to gooberdude, yep.

[woodsyi]

"last, since what i'm putting into the ground is EMI/RFI garbage, should i try and plug all the wires onto a difft circuit?   All this would change is the longest run of my rack's ground wire from 12" to about 7'."

I really wouldn't worry about this. I guess it's a young guy thing to worry about the difference between 7" and 12" 
          d.b.

Dan,

That's 12 inches to 7 feet.  The difference could hurt some one if used in the capacity you are alluding to.   

[gooberdude]

Thanks Woodsyi.....the rack's long ground cable is now 12".  If i were to choose to plug it into a ground on an outlet on a difft circuit, it'd have to be 7'.


knowing this, would 7' be too long for 3/8 braid?


and can anyone tell me how a grounded rack that doesn't touch any gear or cables or anything can produce the changes i've experienced?

everything is wood touching wood (or mdf)

it'd make much more sense if the gear touched the rack via a metal contact...there's none though.

GD

[Dan Banquer]

It's the ground connection to your pre amp as you stated in your initial post and therefore your observations of better reproduction. Having the metal rack grounded is certainly good for safety and certainly no harm as far as conductivity back to the earth at the wall socket.
           d.b.
               

[kirch]

Does this improve any system sound?  My cabinet is all wood, with no metal contact to a hardwood floor.  Is there a way I can still benefit from grounding all my componenets?  If so, what's the best way to go about this?

Thanks -