Affordable Grounding

ALL,

Disconnected my dedicated ground rod and do not hear a difference.  I installed that rod some years ago and had different audio gear.  Maybe at that time I thought there was a difference?  Any hoo, Thanks for all the help.

Lawrence From Michigan

Now I feel a bit awkward.  I DO have an old ground outside the house.

I forgot I had a Signal Generator from my telcom. days.  Hooked that up and lo and behold!!  A ground wire.  This wire I thought was an old coax cable turned out to be ground with sixty two years and many coats of paint!  Goes from the meter down to inside the crawl space, most likely to a rod or the water pipe.  It is at least 1/4 inch dia.

Thanks Jim for all the help.

Now I feel a bit awkward.  I DO have an old ground outside the house.

I forgot I had a Signal Generator from my telcom. days.  Hooked that up and lo and behold!!  A ground wire.  This wire I thought was an old coax cable turned out to be ground with sixty two years and many coats of paint!  Goes from the meter down to inside the crawl space, most likely to a rod or the water pipe.  It is at least 1/4 inch dia.

Thanks Jim for all the help.

Whew!!  A Lot of info here.  Thanks Jim.

My Rental has it's own drop from a pole on a side road, fed to an old panel that uses the round screw-in glass fuses, in the house.  Of course a meter is mounted directly on outside wall first.  

I know where the main water feed from the main house is, coming up from under house inside the bathroom vanity.

My Landlord, long passed, was the person(along with his Father) that built the main house first in 59-60.  Same two prong system.  Mrs. Landlord stayed in the house alone until she had to go to nursing home, where she still is at 94 years old.  I take care of the whole property, thus keeping the rent low.  For some reason their children want nothing to do with the property, but the eldest son is taking care of the $$$.  They are waiting for her passing, then sell the property.  The main house I believe has a ground rod just underneath the meter outside the main house.  So, if they had the sense to install a ground there, I would think they did also at my rental.

I'm not going start removing panels or hire electricians for this old place.  The Son will not either.  They do not want to put $$$ into this rental.  I do all the maintenance on the property.

I will disconnect the new ground and get back to the Forum with my observations.

Thank you for taking the time to share your professional advise.

No offense taken Jim.  I used that term.  Just having fun with this thread.   But also trying to learn something new.

Is there a way to check for the ground on the water pipe without physically looking at it?

The meaning of HERMIT is one that retires from society and lives in solitude especially for religious reasons

I, on the other hand, think that I am getting more and more like a hermit everyday. Except that my desire for solitude and to retire from society has nothing to do with religion.

Jim,  This house was not built with an access to the crawl space, where the water supply comes up from underground.  This house is a rental, in the back yard of the main house.  My water comes from a buried steel line from the main house in their basement.  I could tear apart a section of the covering but I assume the landlord not like.

So, you are suggesting that no matter an old original ground exist, undo the connection to the dedicated rod I installed?  For safety reasons and audio gear protection?

"I guess I'm just an ignorant old man."

I've been renting this little place for 28 years.  Rent is only $350.00/mo. and that INCLUDES heat and electricity.  If that makes me an ignorant Hermit then so be it.  I have everything I need.  Thanks!

Nope. 

Michigan  -  Minnesota   Eh?  What's the diff.. 

Ha! Ha!  Just got home.  I am happy.  Happy as a Hermit!!  I do have a multimeter.  Too tired for now. Will update later.

Lawrence From Michigan

Jim, Thanks for the advice> I am not an electrician.  This structure is resting on blocks and has no foundation.  Small crawl space and yes, it is possible the ground is on the steel water pipe.  All wood construction.  Two 20 amp circuits.

"Like I said the ground rod provides no protection from an electrical shock either. What it does do is provide a path for lightning in the event of a nearby lightning strike entering your home and damaging your equipment. I would remove the ground rod wire from the house entirely."

This statement is contradicting.  I want a path for lightning but then you state to remove the ground rod.....?  Please educate me.  Also use a Furman surge protector/conditioner.

 I guess I'm just an ignorant old man.  

……it is painfully obvious that some people even the same ones still do not understand nor want to understand the difference between grounding electively and grounding your components where you have continuity between them. 

I left much unsaid about my situation.  The home I have been living in for the last 28 years is a small cottage type structure, 20'x20' built in 1960.  The builders were NOT professional contractors by any means.  Nothing was built to current codes/standards.  I don't even think the used a basic level much.  Outlets are all two prong - no ground to the old panel and NO outside ground rod that I can see.  That is why I installed a ground rod and quality three prong outlet/receptical for my audio/TV system.  I have a digital antenna on my roof right above where I sit to listen to music and watch TV and the pole is aluminum.  Scares the bejesus out of me every time a thunder storm comes through.

@lrlacosse  in his post above, mentions the same thing I was asking about. The rod outside the audio room grounding to audio room outlets wouldn't be to code and also I don't know if any benefit could be found?  It would have to be grounded back to main panel correct? 
 

I want to install a sub panel in audio room is what I'm gonna do. Using the heaviest gauge wire possible to main panel. Even then using another grounding rod it would still have to ground at main panel! A silver rod, How much for one of them?  

@jea48 

I’m no wordsmith and post using a phone, but isn’t that what I said?

The guys at Audio Science Forum (or whatever the name is) tend to be a tad pedantic and are a little to into measuring things that really can’t be measured completely, but they have a great video explaining the issues with multiple ground paths.

ill see if I can find it.

Check out Russ Andrews he has some great grounding products that work with good instructions and explainations. All different levels of grounding at Russandrews.com

Another good read on this subject…

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/grounding-cable-gauge-size

I have a high efficiency tube SET and horn system. I found that “properly” utilizing a complete Puritan grounding system gave me excellent results.

Specifically:

1. Started with a PM 156 conditioner

2. Grounded the 156 to a dedicated City Master

3. For components, added a Route Master and grounded every component.

4. Grounded the Route Master with its own City Master

Hope that helps.

Just a general comment, you do NOT want a separate ground path other than the ground path of the circuit breaker.  This will cause the breaker to no trip in the event of overload and is a massive code violation and fire hazard.  No sane electrician who valued his license would do it.

A dedicated line (perhaps with a dedicated ground) for the box is ideal.

+1 on the Puritan GroundMaster.

Short Review From Terry London of Stereo Times

If our audio room is say 50' away from my service panel and I drive a new rod right outside the audio room, I have to install a bare copper grounding wire from the rod all the way back to the service panel. I forgot the gauge of said wire but it's a big wire you know what I'm talking about! Then you could run smaller ground wires from audio room to the new ground rod? Would this work? 

This is why I went with Puritan Audio Labs groundmaster: 

....To meet emissions regulations these appliances use their Earth connection as a dumping place for the interference they generate. And with substations often serving hundreds of houses, your HiFi Earth/Ground connection may well be connected to thousands of Earth Line polluting appliances.

Long before the problem of high frequency interference on the Earth Line became as serious as it is today, audiophiles in the know were utilising additional Ground Rods to provide an independent Earth to their HiFi installations. Elegant as this solution may seem, this is a colossally dangerous practice for the vast majority of current installations*. This is because it risks the potentially massive current from any fault between your HiFi and your local substation finding the easiest path to Earth through your HiFi with expensive, and possibly tragic, results! This is why the practice of introducing directly connected supplementary or dedicated HiFi Ground Rods is specifically prohibited by current UK Wiring Regulations. (Except in very specific circumstances). By utilising the Puritan Ground Master the hazards (and illegality) associated with the use of additional HiFi Ground Rods are totally avoided. And this is achieved without compromising the effective route to ground and hence the removal, of undesirable noise disturbance frequencies on the Earth Line. With the Puritan Ground Master used in conjunction with an additional Ground Rod the potentially dangerous route to Earth of mains frequency currents is safely isolated whilst offending noise and disturbance frequencies are permitted a highly efficient, extremely low impedance route to ground ensuring their elimination. * For the past 50 years houses have normally been connected using the Protective Multiple Earth (PME) system, whereby the Neutral Line is bonded to Earth at the substation and at other points along the way and with Neutral and Earth circuits separated at the point of entry to the building. This style of installation provides the greatest dangers if using additional ground rods without connecting though the Ground Master whilst other styles of household Earth connection will still benefit greatly with increased safety and performance.

@bolong   Good reference.

‘Signal ground’ vs ‘Earth ground’ – aka Chassis ground – aka Safety ground.

Signal ground originates within the component itself.   Earth ground is a safety configuration for the household circuitry.    Regarding audio, electrical noise/hash migrates to either type of ground for different reasons.   Reducing that electrical noise/hash results in better SQ – with a blacker background.

Caelin Gabriel discusses Signal vs Earth ground starting at 19 min 20 sec in this video. 

Just be careful not to have two different grounding rods in your house's electrical system that can cause issue with grounding and potential difference between the two grounding rods, and poses a safety issue.

^ this

Just be careful not to have two different grounding rods in your house's electrical system that can cause issue with grounding and potential difference between the two grounding rods, and poses a safety issue as well. many places its against code to do this so check your local codes before modifying your electrical system.  

The "signal ground" tactic to a DIY "signal grounding box" worked very well on my system. The ground leads buried in the grounding box material (fine quartz sand mixed with fine graphite powder) are soldered to RCA connectors which are then plugged into unused RCA connections on the back of the CD transport and the DAC. Each component had its own dedicated grounding box.As per a suggestion I heard from Caelin Gabriel of Shunyata in an old interview I grounded only two source components. This instantly sucked noise out of my system - not subtle. The system was already on a dedicated line, so there was still enough noise left in the system that grounding boxes made an audible difference.

Gents,

Grounding circuits perform several functions and each has its requirements in terms of design. Safety is a number one requirements, and for this the ability to pass a fault current to a ground reference (earth) instead of through your body is the primary design goal. This "design" however effective for safety does not mean it's a good RF (radio frequency) ground. Safety grounds require a good low resistance path to ground; RF grounds require a good low impedance path to ground. As the RF frequency rises, your reactance (impedance) of the ground circuit rises. For your "black" background, you want to ensure the best low impedance ground for your equipment, i.e. very large gauge ground conductor or flat copper strap to a ground rod, shortest path possible from equipment, and use a termination ground (single point) from all your gear. No special stuff here, my studio grounding system is less than $200 worth of materials. Noise mitigation from your power line is a whole other science I'm sure has been discussed in length - I use brute force L/C filters and isolation transformers, but the grounding considerations are the same. (In the "old days" we used motor-generators for clean AC). 

Write Synergistic Research on it in crayon, charge $600 for it and whole-heartedly recommend at least 3 for best results, and the cable sniffers will follow you to the ends of the earth.

Yes.  Best results(for me) was installing a ground rod just outside the wall, running CU cable through wall to my dedicated AC outlet(hospital Grade) ground connection,  then ALL AC power to my system plugged in to that receptacle.

A'gon user @mahgister has written here previously about devices such as this, IIRC.

Lots of discussion of these devices, primarily DIY, here:

DIY Ground Box Thread

I haven't tried nor do I advocate these tweaks but if one were to do so, I'm guessing the improvement would be more substantial with one of these. A relative bargain compared to similar offerings from Nordost and Entreq at 10 to 20 times less cost.

Ground Box for Sale

I don’t know what the wooden tube does, but I concur with @bolivarjoy, I had a dedicated line from the panel with true earth ground rod and hospital grade pure copper AC outlets installed. Digital source, 20 wpc 300b/845 SET tube amp and high sensitivity Klipsch Forte speakers.  The dedicated line dropped the noise floor to the floor! Also powers the router, dedicated switch box, and LP supplies.

I could always hear transformer hum through the speakers in between tracks or with quiet passages.  Tried DC filters, USB filters, lower gain signal tubes, and even minus 10dB attenuation, still hum.  Worse some days than others, quietist late at night. Once the dedicated line installed, transformer hum virtually gone, I no longer can hear from seat.
 

Second best upgrade was a DDC between a fanless mini PC streaming source and the DAC, darker background, larger soundstage and way better stereo images. Together with dedicated line, I might actually be done…with this system anyway. Have four others I can tinker with. 

Anyone in this hobby knows we have all thrown money away chasing something.  The best money I ever spent was in having an electrician put in a dedicated line for my stereo equipment. Next best money was in buying a grounding box and driving a grounding rod into the ground outside the house and then running all my equipment through it. Period. The black background is stark and eerily quiet. I probably have $3,000 in these two things and I would never do it any other way if excellent sound is the goal. Just my .02

Thanks for the excellent overview Mike.