So I was changing a lightbulb last night…


I had just finished listening to a record and decided to change a lightbulb that had gone out directly above my turntable. When I started unscrewing the bulb I noticed a faint buzz coming from my speaker. I then turned the volume way up on my amp and tried again. Turns out the buzzing was happening when my hand touched the metal light fixture, not the lightbulb. 

At first I thought the tubes in my phono stage were picking up an EM field from the light fixture and out of curiosity I grabbed a piece of foil and covered the phono stage and then tried tapping the fixture again, same buzzing. Then I switched the input on my amp to my DAC and tried the tapping, no buzzing. Switched the input back to the phono stage and tapped the fixture, buzzing continued. Then I covered the tonearm with the foil and the buzzing went away almost completely. 

So it appears my tonearm is picking up some sort of signal from the light fixture but only when I touch the fixture. If I turn the lights off there is no buzzing when I tap the fixture. The setup is in the basement and I use LED lights that are recessed in the ceiling and wired to an “LED” dimmer switch. The audio gear is on a dedicated circuit.

Any of the knowledgeable folk on here have an explanation for what’s going on? Doesn’t effect SQ AFAIK since the buzzing only occurs when I touch the metal fixture. Seems odd but I thought it was interesting and maybe a chance for me to learn something from the members. 

I uploaded a video of this happening to Imgur that I’ll try pasting here:   
 

 

Cheers

durte30

Showing 3 responses by harpo75

I loved buellrider97’s quote of “ Hold the TV antenna “.

I remember hearing that as a kid. I’d just touch the big metal tv channel selector know and the picture got better. My dad and older brothers would tell me to just stay right there! Don’t move!

Yes there is an effect/interaction with your body when you touch it. Also dimmer switches are notorious for causing hum, incandescent or LED. I’m having a very slight buzz with mine also. The LED track lights I first purchased weren’t dimmable so I went back those very small incandescent track lights which are controlled by a remote control dimmer switch. Works great and looks wonderful shunning down on the stereo system and speakers. I didn’t really notice the buzz until I was checking a different issue one night and turned the volume way up. I started checking for the buzz now and turned the lights up to look around. Of course as I turned the lights up the buzz changed and when the lights were on full the buzz was barely there. Turned the dimmer coming off and the buzz disappeared.

I have my entire stereo system on two separate 20 amp breakers which are independent from the lights. I also have a 20 amp balanced AC isolation transformer (Equi=Tech) which means the AC is 60-0-60 powering everything except my computer server. That is on one of the 20 amp lines going through a battery backup/regulated AC supply, then through a high end isolation transformer, then to the regulated 12V power supply with a very large bank of capacitors and up to the server. This also is USB isolated with an iFi galvanized power supply to my DAC.

So all this care and the buzz from the dimmer still comes through. Barely but it just shows the issue with dimmer switches. The only thing I can think of (if we want to keep some sort of AC dimming) is to research some sort of AC filtering that can be added right at the dimmer control. Ether a very small isolation transformer or EMI/RFI filtering system that would knock this out. It would have to be right in line with the switch so nothing from the switch or lights can feed back into the AC line.

dirte30 - That would probably help with RFI. Different sizes affect different frequencies. It can get pretty technical trying to examine the line noise for the frequency or frequencies that are causing the problem. But if you have some lying around it would be worth the experiment.

For AC filtering of the light something of this nature might work. They need to be wired inline to the dimmer switch.  These particular ones are way more current then you need but I was looking up units that would cover at least 2-1/2 amps for my needs. 
https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/schaffner-emc-inc/FN2090A-6-06/1997013?s=N4IgTCBcDaIGIDkwAYCcyCCBaAbF5OIAugL5A

Or this: