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Dirty Electricty

D

dbassman59

Dec 19, 2008
189
1
Vancouver, BC
#1
DIRTY ELECTRICTY ... Is there such a thing?

I have noticed that I get a hum or buzz out of my amps at certain times ... not all the time. I've been told I'm a victim of dirty electricity .... interference coming from something.

Sometimes I think it happens more after a wet rain .. (ground is soaked .. so is the "ground" effected?) .. or from light fixtures (fluorescent and halogen) and such.

What causes amps to hum and buzz?

Would a power conditioner clean this up? I'm not talking about a surge protector ... just something to purify the electricity and shield out the hum ... does a power conditioner work like this? Or am I even on the right track?
 
#2
Better surge protectors - ones that have filtering too - are in fact "power conditioners". They just have a different case/form factor. They solve some but not all noise-related problems. And they can't "purify" the AC service, they can only hide some of the mentioned symptoms in the audio band.
 
#4
Short answer: Yes.

I had this problem in my studio. I had the hanging, plug in fluorescent lights that you would find in a garage or shop. When I stop using those and went to some track lighting (I bought some grounded replacement chords that I just wired in so I can still unplug them if I want) most of my hum went away. I also added another ground to the circuit that seemed to help. The way my shed is wired, I have one power line running from my main house box to a sub box in my shed. Naturally the grounds are tied together but I ran one from my sub box to give me a whole circuit a second ground. This is just my setup though; I would have to hear more about yours to give you any ideas.
 
#5
dbassman59 said:
Do they hide it enough to be noticeable?
Click to expand...

I have a Furman in my rack, primarily for a rack mount power strip, but one of their claims is that it "conditions" the power. I don't know enough to comment on the tech aspects of that claim, and there is a wide range of opinions here on TB about them, but I can tell you that it didn't have any noticeable effect. Neither did my guitarists $250(not sure which brand though) battery backup/surge protector/"conditioner" that's made for high end computers.

If you're using fluorescent bulbs or lights, change those out first. You can do that fairly cheaply.

PS; just so you know, it's the ballasts that fluorescent lights run on that cause the issue. If you listen closely and watch your lights, sometimes the noise will "pules" in time with the bulbs. Easier to see the colder it is, when they're warmed up you won't see the flickering.
 
#6
sirpug said:
I had this problem in my studio. I had the hanging, plug in fluorescent lights that you would find in a garage or shop. When I stop using those and went to some track lighting (I bought some grounded replacement chords that I just wired in so I can still unplug them if I want) most of my hum went away. I also added another ground to the circuit that seemed to help. The way my shed is wired, I have one power line running from my main house box to a sub box in my shed. Naturally the grounds are tied together but I ran one from my sub box to give me a whole circuit a second ground. This is just my setup though; I would have to hear more about yours to give you any ideas.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty much stuck .. one of the places it hums is in my basement where we practise weekly with my Classic Rock band. The other is at church where I play every Sunday. That is the most annoying place.

I usually end up switching my tweeter off in both cases to get rid of the hum ... The problem here is my amps sound so much better with the tweeters working ... The church set up is full of flourescent and halogen fixtures ... I can't do anything about those ...
 
#8
In that case I would recommend asking the biggest compute geek (friendly geek to geek use only) you know if they have one of the high dollar conditioners to borrow or see if you can rent one first. It might do just enough for you to justify the expense. I didn't notice any difference with my Furman or my guitarists unit.
 
#9
Grounding is what has always driven me crazy. If you don't have a good ground, you will get oddball noise galore. Go to home depot and get a "Ground tester":

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For $8. It's a fine thing to keep in your kit if you like your amps to not blow up.

And yes, Fluorescent lights suck suck suck. Something to do with the very high voltage they operate at puts out all kinda EM that makes amps & single coil p'ups uhhappy - but sometimes you just have to deal. How about NEON signs right behind your rig - as in a beer sign on a bar wall? Been there, done that. Happily, folks in a bar don't seem to notice noise like that.
 
#10
When you do run into power problems try this test: unplug your instrument cord from the amp. If the noise goes away it's airborne RFI and EMI that's captured by your pickups and cord, and no amount of 'conditioning' will remove it. The only cure is to remove from the environment whatever is causing the RFI and EMI, and if it's not your property chances are that's not an option.
 
#11
billfitzmaurice said:
When you do run into power problems try this test: unplug your instrument cord from the amp. If the noise goes away it's airborne RFI and EMI that's captured by your pickups and cord, and no amount of 'conditioning' will remove it. The only cure is to remove from the environment whatever is causing the RFI and EMI, and if it's not your property chances are that's not an option.
Click to expand...

+1 billion, Bill beat me to it. You've GOT to establish whether it's your bass, or your amp, before you can decide what to do.
 
#12
Power conditioners do not clean the house power, at best they just regulate the voltage. To isolate yourself from "dirty electricty" you need a product like the Furman Balanced Power IT-20 ($1800.00)

I have wondered if anyone has tried this little product and if it works?
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