buzzzzz, where did i go wrong?

I think my fiance soon to be wife is starting to really wonder about me!

Hey JD.......Bob here.The reason I asked you about the neutrals or white wires is that these are also referenced to the same grounding nuetral bar in your main panel.You should have a grounding neutral bar in your sub-panel.Tell me if you fed your sub-panel with hot ,neutral and ground or if you just ran the hot wire to your fuses and did you install a breaker in your main panel to branch from.Back to the neutrals,the grounding bar in your sub panel has a bonding screw through it to ground the enclosure itself.This bond is NOT USED for sub-panels.Also one other very important item is your metal conduit connection if its functioning as your ground consider that the point that it connects to your main panel is likely inches away from the grounding neutral bar and being connected directly to the panel enclosure you will certainly pick up stray voltages.The best way to accomplish your outlet grounds is get the Hubbells or Leviiton Hospital outlets with isolated grounds and run separate wires back to your panel.You can then use your conduit as a shield by connecting it to the panel end only and using a plastic washer on the outlet box(if metal) to isolate it.One more great thing to finish off the grounding job is if you have room in your main panel install an additional grounding bar(these are readily available and designed to attatch to your existing bar) and connect all your new outlet neutrals and grounds to this bar.If you can install the bar as close to your service ground as possible(also you should connect your rods right next to the service ground) this gives your audio circuits the most direct path to earth and minimizes the reaction from the rest of your house wiring.I used to wire houses in my younger days and was close to becoming a journeyman electrician before deciding on another career.Hope this helps and feel free to email me if you like....

Dear all,
thanks for all your inputs. I am unfortunately on the graveyard shift but as soon as I get home I will examine my various panels and subpanels and try to figure it out. I am a bit unsure whether I should be examining high volatage electrical panels after having been up all night but what is life without a little risk.
Sean, on the email I sent you that I think you didn't get I mentioned that some friends and I will be in Chicago on May 8-10 and I think we are going to wrigley on the 9th. Maybe you would like to join us since I think that is where you are from! You can reply by email or whatever. Tix are I think $26 plus tixmaster's damn fee.
JD

you know, after lifting all the grounds with cheater plugs except for one (the preamp) I still have a small buzz as well as a hiss. I think after I finish the regrounding stuff I will have to shut off every breaker in the house testing each one, one by one to see if any of them are contributing. There are several halogens as well as several lutron dimmers about. If I throw the breakers with those lights and dimmers does that mean they can no longer be a problem?
Also, using a multimeter is there a way to test a cable to see if it is faulty as well as the expedident of listening to it? I am wondering if the problem isn't internal to my rig. what about other multimeter uses?
JD

JD, you can try to measure the resistance between the various grounds. You can go from the ground on the breaker box to each individual rod and see what resistance that you get. If you get readings that are all very close, that is a good thing. The further apart the readings are, the more potential for hum and ground loops. This will also verify that you have a good connection from the box to each individual rod.

Another test is to measure from one ground rod to another ground rod. This will measure the conductivity of the soil around each individual rod. Obviously, the lower the reading, the more conductive the Earth. It is possible to have rods located within just a few feet of each other and have VERY different levels of conductivity. I recently did some digging around my house and found that i had a very high clay content in one section. Moving over just a few feet showed very little to no clay. Obviously, this would make a BIG difference in terms of conductivity and ground potential. Sean
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