Isolated Ground

Where are you located, and what do you know about your electrical service? It has a large bearing on what you can do...

As you describe it, don't do it - driving your own earth stake to provide sole grounding for the hifi's power socket is NOT safe (for several reasons) nor will it be an improvement on using the supplied earth.

But that doesn't necessarily mean you can't improve on your current situation.

M.

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Originally posted by Martin Clark:
Where are you located, and what do you know about your electrical service? It has a large bearing on what you can do...

As you describe it, don't do it - driving your own earth stake to provide sole grounding for the hifi's power socket is NOT safe (for several reasons) nor will it be an improvement on using the supplied earth.

But that doesn't necessarily mean you can't improve on your current situation.

M.

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absolutely. for example, depending on how your supply is delivered, if there is a break in your service earth circuit, your dedicated earth MAY end up being THE only working path to earth. imagine that!

enjoy(?)

ken

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Originally posted by kevroy:
I've got a dedicated mains spur feeding a single outlet for my system. I'm considering replacing the outlet with an isolated ground unit, which I'd connect to it's own earthing rod. Anyone tried this with positive results? Also - any comments on a dedicated mains spur vs. ring? (A ring loops the wiring back to the circuit breaker)

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a spur (or more correctly, radial) is better, as adviced in almost all naim manuals.

enjoy

ken

Hi Kevroy,

1) Two radials (spurs) are better than one ring. I can't say I've compared these with the same grade of wiring but in general the idea of putting spurs in is to seperate components from other devices that the mains feeds. A ring will common together various bits of your hi-fi - which are best kept apart.

2) Earthing schemes vary greatly depending on when your house was built/what may have happened since. As posted before, if your house shares an earth connection with a number of others in the vicintiy and the earth connection is faulty somewhere, the most direct path to earth may well be through your (proposed) spike. The term 'consult an electrician' spring vigorously to mind!!

To answer your question a correctly installed earth can increase the clarity quite noticeably - for reasons not quite understood (by me anyway)...

Cheers!

Richard.