Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site
In the Forum: Audio Discussions
In the Thread: It’s mad, mad, mad... electricity.
Post Subject: "Mains Ground"Posted by Paul S on: 3/26/2011
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The "mains ground" is not necessarily worth a crap, electrically; it is just whatever ground system happens to be attached to the main service shared neutral/ground bus. In fact, some older systems may yet use the dreaded "floating" ground. I have seen and dealt with this, myself.
As for changing the "mains ground", the "combined" ground might be safely re-located, possibly even to good electrical advantage. Also, depending on system-specific ground scheme and routing it might be useful to add a "dedicated ground" just for the hi-fi, to bleed off local "standing" current. This is no silver bullet, however, since "redundant" grounding may exacerbate or even cause system-specific ground loops, which can ruin any hoped-for sonic advantages.
Generally, to lift the neutral is not simply unsafe but it results in an open circuit, so sound goes from bad to zero. Making things electrically and sonically more complex, few electrical systems feature truly separate, unbroken nuetral and ground wires that run their separate courses all the way from the main service box to the appliance in question. The usual/almost inevitable mix/mosh of ground and neutral wires throughout a typical system is the generally-overlooked and often-ignored source of plenty of audible garbage, including noise that "starts on the hot line". This separate routing and isolation would be the first thing I would tackle if I owned the house I live in; and I may just do it, anyway.
Best regards,
Paul SRerurn to Romy the Cat's Site