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Chassis or signal grounding why it works


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Howdy, Roger, nice to see you here! I've been following your exploits all the way, and the latest round looks the goods in every sense - you should be getting the invisible speaker thing now, or very close to it - would that be right?

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HI Frank,

Got your message so came over here...looks pretty good. I have had invisible speakers..so to say on orchestral music for many years. Now the trick is to expand that sound stage top to bottom and side to side where the room totally disappears....chassis grounding is the only way to move one far enough into the music where this will happen among other things.

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Will just mention that your last couple of videos are very impressive - the qualities are coming through clearly, top stuff!

 

Wouldn't go so far to say that chassis grounding is the "only way" :P - it's "a way", and it's fantastic that it's worked for you, and for others too, as you've mentioned. What's good about your approach is that it's relatively easy for others to experiment, and see whether they get the benefit - no silly money involved! :)

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Yes Frank chassis grounding tends to be cumulative as all components that are IC'd to the preamp should be in the circuit. What this accomplishes is that you are adding a parallel circuit for common mode noise to the signal path which the IC's carry. The purer the audio signal the greater the SQ.

Yes that Keith Jarrett video was taken a few days ago...now clarity has improved again...exciting stuff...and your right you don't need to spend 1k's or 10k's of $$$$$$

 

Been a long day Frank....see ya tomorrow.

 

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When you get a chance Roger, could you post that Jarret video link here (the one you took a couple of days ago) & another comparative recording (done with the same recording gear) from early in your journey (or before your grounding experiments) in order for us to get a handle on what has changed in the sound - is it capturable? 

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Hi Kevin,

Yes exactly as the picture shows and explains "stray EMI" and it is surprising how much common mode noise there can be in a system. Now I use 5 amplifiers in my system.

The braided cable would possibly be better,but in my circuit heavy cable is best. 

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4 hours ago, mmerrill99 said:

When you get a chance Roger, could you post that Jarret video link here (the one you took a couple of days ago) & another comparative recording (done with the same recording gear) from early in your journey (or before your grounding experiments) in order for us to get a handle on what has changed in the sound - is it capturable? 

Hi,

The Wurlitzer video was made 8 months ago and as you said the KJ is current.

 

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23 minutes ago, RogerD said:

Hi Kevin,

...............................

The braided cable would possibly be better,but in my circuit heavy cable is best. 

I think that the experts like Ralph Morrison, Henry Ott & Jim brown would say the a flat braided strap of the same cross-section area is better. The one in the photo is way big.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Grounding Systems

SRPP :: System Reference Potential Plane
STGP :: Signal Transport Ground Plane
ZSRG :: Zero Signal Reference Grid
ZSRG :: Zero Signal Reference Conductors
ZSRP :: Zero Signal Reference Potential
ZSRP :: Zero Signal Reference Plane
MESH-CBN :: Meshed Common Bonding Network
MESH-IBN :: Meshed Isolated Bonding Network
PEC :: Paralleled Earth Conductors
PBC :: Paralleled Bonding Conductors

 

While Keith Armstrong prefers to call them:
"Conductive Structures"

 

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Btw in the KJ recording I have my air conditioning running,which is why it almost sounds like tape hiss. It has been near 100 degrees in Reno for about 3 weeks and the AC has been mandatory.

 

Also both Wurlitzer videos are the same...I couldn't see a way to remove the one extra.

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No matter what you do, star type grounding only works at low frequencies.  If your system is all analog this might be good enough, but if you have any digital componentry, forget about it.  The impedance to ground will be too high to avoid circulation (loops) of ground current, and the additional noise.

I prefer the approach taken by some enlightened audio manufacturers, float everything and use balanced connections.

BTW, I am not suggesting lifting grounds on components designed to be grounded, as this could be hazardous to one's health in the event of a serious internal failure/short.

I am only pointing out that grounding is not nearly as simple as it may at first appear.

SO/ROON/HQPe: DSD 512-Sonore opticalModuleDeluxe-Signature Rendu optical with Well Tempered Clock--DIY DSC-2 DAC with SC Pure Clock--DIY Purifi Amplifier-Focus Audio FS888 speakers-JL E 112 sub-Nordost Tyr USB, DIY EventHorizon AC cables, Iconoclast XLR & speaker cables, Synergistic Purple Fuses, Spacetime system clarifiers.  ISOAcoustics Oreas footers.                                                       

                                                                                           SONORE computer audio

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28 minutes ago, barrows said:

No matter what you do, star type grounding only works at low frequencies.  If your system is all analog this might be good enough, but if you have any digital componentry, forget about it.  The impedance to ground will be too high to avoid circulation (loops) of ground current, and the additional noise.

I prefer the approach taken by some enlightened audio manufacturers, float everything and use balanced connections.

BTW, I am not suggesting lifting grounds on components designed to be grounded, as this could be hazardous to one's health in the event of a serious internal failure/short.

I am only pointing out that grounding is not nearly as simple as it may at first appear.

Read more  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Typical old school response....your missing the entire point. Extreme grounding is basically like rack mounting your audiophile system (which nobody does because no consumer audiophile gear has rack mount ears). Then using a single star ground to go to mains ground. Granted if the equipment is internally star grounded this may not be needed,but so few pieces even gear that costs 10,20,30 thousand are not grounded or shielded correctly...much less all the gear is not match grounded either.

The first thing top pro audio techs do is improved the internal ground scheme. They still know that the gear will be rack mounted,bonded,and the whole rack will be grounded to mains ground.

The problem is not from the wall out...the problem is from the wall in. Many spend thousands on transformers conditioning ect....if the Utility supply is clean...it's a waste of money. Digital only suffers because most don't understand simple grounding ....there is a ton of mag interference in digital equipment. You take that away and the inherent low noise floor will kick ass on about everything except a dolby master tape.

Rule is ......it's the size of the pathway back to ground that matters.

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Wow!  It appears that you responded without even reading my post.

 

Star grounding is ineffective at high frequencies, period.  This is not "old school" this RF engineering.  I learned this from Bruno Putzeys, hardly an "old school" engineer.

SO/ROON/HQPe: DSD 512-Sonore opticalModuleDeluxe-Signature Rendu optical with Well Tempered Clock--DIY DSC-2 DAC with SC Pure Clock--DIY Purifi Amplifier-Focus Audio FS888 speakers-JL E 112 sub-Nordost Tyr USB, DIY EventHorizon AC cables, Iconoclast XLR & speaker cables, Synergistic Purple Fuses, Spacetime system clarifiers.  ISOAcoustics Oreas footers.                                                       

                                                                                           SONORE computer audio

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Ummm, grounding will work at very high frequencies if the impedance of the connecting mechanism, cables or whatever, is low enough - it's all about the inductance of the path. This is why ground planes are used in higher speed circuits, to ensure the potential at all frequencies of concern can't glitch on the conductor - and the ground plane works because it's very wide for its "length". Do a cable that mimics that geometry to some degree and you're in much better shape for ensuring that "ground" does exist for higher frequencies.

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Yes & it appears that what this extreme grounding is achieving is affording a path of least resistance/least impedance to noise (LF & HF) that would normally travel between interconnected devices, connected by ICs.

 

This noise travelling on the shields of coax ICs or whatever would seem to normally intermingle with signal & its removal from this pathway results in clarity.

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@barrows what frequencies are you considering 'low' in the system sense? Yes for digital circuitry where decoupling needs to extend to 100's of MHz, then ground planes are the only way to get low enough impedance. But in Roger's context I'd hazard that he's concerned about frequencies below a MHz - the region where SMPSUs are operating.

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What is puzzling to me is the "burn-in time" needed for a new ground strap to reach full effectiveness.

 

If this was just a new path of least inductance being introduced would it not be fully effective right off the bat? Anybody explain this burn-in time delay (without invoking dielectrics)?

 

If it is dielectrics would copper braid strapping be fully effective immediately? An experiment that would be  easy to conduct.

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13 minutes ago, mmerrill99 said:

What is puzzling to me is the "burn-in time" needed for a new ground strap to reach full effectiveness.

 

If this was just a new path of least inductance being introduced would it not be fully effective right off the bat? Anybody explain this burn-in time delay (without invoking dielectrics)?

 

If it is dielectrics would copper braid strapping be fully effective immediately? An experiment that would be  easy to conduct.

 

Interesting thinking ... it's possible that tension in the connecting braid is injecting noise along the conductor by a parastic behaviour; it takes time for all the materials to relax in their new position, and this is the stabilising period.

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4 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Interesting thinking ... it's possible that tension in the connecting braid is injecting noise along the conductor by a parastic behaviour; it takes time for all the materials to relax in their new position, and this is the stabilising period.

But the new ground strap's function seems to be REMOVING noise from the signal ICs by providing a pathway of least resistance/inductance for this noise.

 

The inherent self-noise in the ground strap is immaterial to this function (as long as it too follows the 'easy' path)

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5 minutes ago, mmerrill99 said:

But the new ground strap's function seems to be REMOVING noise from the signal ICs by providing a pathway of least resistance/inductance for this noise.

 

The inherent self-noise in the ground strap is immaterial to this function (as long as it too follows the 'easy' path)

 

At first sight that would seem so - but any self-noise in the strap could act like the signal picked by an antenna - the latter should short out because it's occurring along a conductor, but there is a different mechanism in place, transferring a signal to the end of the metal.

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15 hours ago, mmerrill99 said:

When you get a chance Roger, could you post that Jarret video link here (the one you took a couple of days ago) & another comparative recording (done with the same recording gear) from early in your journey (or before your grounding experiments) in order for us to get a handle on what has changed in the sound - is it capturable? 

+1 always nice to learn some tricks.

Links would be gratefully received :D

Thank you.

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