[cdacosta]

this video just released which contains some talk about grounding boxes, in the video the guy explains that the best way to connect a grounding box is actually measuring between the iec socket ground and finding a spot which has the lowest resistance to the power inlet socket (which might even be a chassi screw instead of for example rca ground)
has someone tried this?

With due respect, the Shunyata rep is not referencing use of a passive ground box filtering device like I use or write about. They are speaking about ground devices to minimize ground differentials between components. Totally different devices that do different things. Based on the speaker's descriptions of the Altera devices, the binding posts in the units terminate to a single ground plane and each binding post has its own filtering. The filtering is to help isolate noise and likely is using caps to filter different frequency bands. Several designers from the early 2000 era have been using and experimenting with this concept. I have several in my system that was designed in the 2007 - 2010 or so era that I was helping/took part in prototyping across about a year. Works to help smooth AC sine wave and filter out very high frequency noise. It works, is audible, but no where as effective as filtering noise from signal ground. With that said, Shunyata also uses minerals in their designs to filter noise in their products.

I do 100% agree with the person being interviewed from Shunyata, that the internal component noise is distorting and masking information on the recording. And this distorted signal is being transmitted throughout the signal chain. About 2-4 weeks ago I wrote about what I found in regards of passive ground box filtering and the results with different installations. This is applicable with the passive ground box filtering, not star grounding to a single place to minimize ground potential differences.

 

[cdacosta]

My amp has this warning, the blue terminals being the negative output.

Bingo! This is why you have to have different ground boxes filtering the left and right or multiple channels.

 

[cdacosta]

Thanks for sharing this - you beat me to it. I too perked my ears up at his suggestion to do that measurement - I haven't tried it - will have to try that on my return from holiday. They elaborate on it more here - per their guidance the grounding point must be less than 1 ohm resistance to be effective.

Really interesting seeing him touch on some of the same concepts in the design and use of their grounding ‘hubs’ that have proven to be important - and yield great rewards - in our use of grounding boxes. Expect @cdacosta came across this in his pre-reading. This paper expands on some concepts he talked to - https://shunyata.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2022/08/ALTAIRA-Grounding-Concepts-Guide.pdf

What I also read with great interest is that for their ground cables (VTX) they use virtual hollow core ‘tubes’ comprised of copper strands around the perimeter with an air core, and in the case of their top cable, a silver cable at the centre. Stated to reduce skin effect and eddy currents. And although they don’t mention it, should reduce proximity effect too. I’d previously read that a hollow core tube conductor was the theoretical ideal for low impedance transmission of HF current for these reasons. Have had this as a thought experiment for some time I might have to try in the real - to experiment again with copper foils as grounding conductors - and/or splayed apart 14ga AliX cable wires (removing the clear exterior insulator) - but this time wrapped around the exterior of a Teflon tube with say a 0.7-1cm diameter.

I glanced over the link to their Altaira products. This is basically star grounding. Remember completely different concept than ground box signal or earth ground filtering. The Shunyata product is used to minimize the ground potentials of the components in a audio system. The passive ground boxes spoken about in this DIY ground box thread are noise draining devices. It is possible to create a passive ground box that also does the same thing as the Altaira. Issue is two fold, 1) mixing and filtering certain components on the same device can cause what is heard to sound off and 2) some higher end components have their signal grounds isolated from chassis/earth ground.

 

[Ghoostknight]

the second device he talks about uses passive "ferroelectric" materials to reduce noise... but the stargrounding is a good point, i havent looked further into the devices maybe the suggesting of low resistance connections comes purely from a starground design, possibly

 

[cdacosta]

the second device he talks about uses passive "ferroelectric" materials to reduce noise... but the stargrounding is a good point, i havent looked further into the devices maybe the suggesting of low resistance connections comes purely from a starground design, possibly

That is exactly what he is referring to. He mentions that ferroelectric material (minerals) are "also" used. To my knowledge Shunyata does not sell a passive ground filtering device using minerals solely as the filtering material.

 

[Jake2]

I glanced over the link to their Altaira products. This is basically star grounding. Remember completely different concept than ground box signal or earth ground filtering. The Shunyata product is used to minimize the ground potentials of the components in an audio system. The passive ground boxes spoken about in this DIY ground box thread are noise draining devices. It is possible to create a passive ground box that also does the same thing as the Altaira. Issue is two fold, 1) mixing and filtering certain components on the same device can cause what is heard to sound off and 2) some higher end components have their signal grounds isolated from chassis/earth ground.

Thanks. Yes very different products, agree, but some of the problems they are seeking to address are the same, noise on the ground plane, so a number of their observations and some of their methodologies (eg. cable topology) are on point for passive ground boxes too.

 

[cdacosta]

Thanks. Yes very different products, agree, but some of the problems they are seeking to address are the same, noise on the ground plane, so a number of their observations and some of their methodologies (eg. cable topology) are on point for passive ground boxes too.

Could be regarding the cables. Frankly, from the beginning I was looking for a high performing and tonally balanced cable that was "easily affordable" by most. And I found it in the build with the connectors and Ali 6N copper wire. But absolutely with enough time experimenting and money spent in materials a better cable can be built. There are retail ground box cables from $160 to $1500+ for 1.6m.

I am hoping a member comes up with one and shares the recipe! ) There are several things I am thinking of trying but would be expensive to experiment with. Like using a high quality (Neotech and Mundorf) silver/gold/copper blend conductor with varying gauge conductors and trying varying geometries. Then using ultra pure low mass solderless connectors. Mucho dinero... LOL

 

[Jake2]

Could be regarding the cables. Frankly, from the beginning I was looking for a high performing and tonally balanced cable that was "easily affordable" by most. And I found it in the build with the connectors and Ali 6N copper wire. But absolutely with enough time experimenting and money spent in materials a better cable can be built. There are retail ground box cables from $160 to $1500+ for 1.6m.

I am hoping a member comes up with one and shares the recipe! ) There are several things I am thinking of trying but would be expensive to experiment with. Like using a high quality (Neotech and Mundorf) silver/gold/copper blend conductor with varying gauge conductors and trying varying geometries. Then using ultra pure low mass solderless connectors. Mucho dinero... LOL

Well great minds… today I placed orders on AliX for some formable ‘soft’ copper tubes (pretty ordinary copper but quite cheap) in several gauges and some also quite ordinary and cheap thick braided copper “sleeves”. I’ll try both as grounding conductors but the latter in its largest form should be large enough to add as another layer of shielding on interconnect or power cables that it would very easy to ground. Oh and a bunch of other copper sheets for a shielding project for my DAC and amp.

Also got very close to ordering 10m of 22mm wide 0.07mm thick Mundorf copper foil… not that expensive actually.. whereas the silver was too rich for my blood.

 

[cdacosta]

Well great minds… today I placed orders on AliX for some formable ‘soft’ copper tubes (pretty ordinary copper but quite cheap) in several gauges and some also quite ordinary and cheap thick braided copper “sleeves”. I’ll try both as grounding conductors but the latter in its largest form should be large enough to add as another layer of shielding on interconnect or power cables that it would very easy to ground. Oh and a bunch of other copper sheets for a shielding project for my DAC and amp.

Also got very close to ordering 10m of 22mm wide 0.07mm thick Mundorf copper foil… not that expensive actually.. whereas the silver was too rich for my blood.

Will likely sound awful for grounding box cable. What are you planning to do with this copper material?

 

[EDhaenens]

I also ordered these sleeves. I will use them to shield my tv power cable. That cable is a normal two prong power cable built into the tv. The connector will be replaced by a Furutech clone and will be used at the same time to filter the power strip.

 

[EDhaenens]

Could be regarding the cables. Frankly, from the beginning I was looking for a high performing and tonally balanced cable that was "easily affordable" by most. And I found it in the build with the connectors and Ali 6N copper wire. But absolutely with enough time experimenting and money spent in materials a better cable can be built. There are retail ground box cables from $160 to $1500+ for 1.6m.

I am hoping a member comes up with one and shares the recipe! ) There are several things I am thinking of trying but would be expensive to experiment with. Like using a high quality (Neotech and Mundorf) silver/gold/copper blend conductor with varying gauge conductors and trying varying geometries. Then using ultra pure low mass solderless connectors. Mucho dinero... LOL

Maybe set up a crowd funding
Will benefit all of us eventually.

 

[cdacosta]

Maybe set up a crowd funding
Will benefit all of us eventually.

Great idea, I would be happy to volunteer my time to experiment.

What is tricky, just like with interconnects, everything that goes into the build of the cable effects how it will perform in its role. This is why when I was able to come up with the 11awg. copper variant build, I was sharing and recommending it. To have a cable used with ground box application, that is tonally balanced, not be flawed sonically (in anyway I can audibly detect) is very hard. You experienced this with just the slightly excessive use of Teflon with the same cable design remember? What is crazy is one cable not in the signal chain, can effect the sonic reproduction of an entire system. I have been saying this from the beginning, you recently experienced it.

Here is an example of how much a single cable adjustment or change matters when used with this type of filtering device. For context, in my system there are 12 of my DIY ground boxes, isolated AC between components, umpteen tweaks, upgraded fuses, high end cabling, etc., etc. This is a relatively expensive headphone system. I was experimenting with cabling at the ground box that is filtering the brass coax connector at/coming from the wall. This coax connector provides the Internet feed to my system. The cable is connected to the outer ground of the coax connector. So not in the signal path. The cable from the ground box going to the coax connector is the dual twisted 6N wire with 11AWG. No connectors, all direct point to point bare conductors with only Nano Liquid used. The experiment...

Tried adding another leg of the same wire (one at a time), 14ga. leg, 20ga. leg, (2) 14ga. legs... in all cases lowered system performance. In each scenario, sonically the system sounded different and worse than with just the twisted 11AWG. Then tried adding a 20ga. solid core 5N Cardas silver, which threw the system tonal balance off. In all scenarios what was heard was immediate and obvious.

As part of the above experiment I also tried disconnecting the 11ga., so no box attached. Also tried just one 14ga. leg, instead of the twisted dual 14ga (11AWG). With one 14ga. only, there was a loss of body and bass slam, lower resolution across the frequency spectrum. Disconnecting the box completely negatively impacted the system a little more similar to with just one 14ga.

See how much time and different materials are required to properly experiment and come up with superior cable builds? Another factor is different builds are likely going to tonally shift systems. Meaning like how interconnect electrical properties based on design (geometries, conductor spacing, dielectrics, metal materials and purity) change how they effect a system tonally. Sorry, long winded but this is a deep and complicated subject.

 

[EDhaenens]

Great idea, I would be happy to volunteer my time to experiment.

What is tricky, just like with interconnects, everything that goes into the build of the cable effects how it will perform in its role. This is why when I was able to come up with the 11awg. copper variant build, I was sharing and recommending it. To have a cable used with ground box application, that is tonally balanced, not be flawed sonically (in anyway I can audibly detect) is very hard. You experienced this with just the slightly excessive use of Teflon with the same cable design remember? What is crazy is one cable not in the signal chain, can effect the sonic reproduction of an entire system. I have been saying this from the beginning, you recently experienced it.

Here is an example of how much a single cable adjustment or change matters when used with this type of filtering device. For context, in my system there are 12 of my DIY ground boxes, isolated AC between components, umpteen tweaks, upgraded fuses, high end cabling, etc., etc. This is a relatively expensive headphone system. I was experimenting with cabling at the ground box that is filtering the brass coax connector at/coming from the wall. This coax connector provides the Internet feed to my system. The cable is connected to the outer ground of the coax connector. So not in the signal path. The cable from the ground box going to the coax connector is the dual twisted 6N wire with 11AWG. No connectors, all direct point to point bare conductors with only Nano Liquid used. The experiment...

Tried adding another leg of the same wire (one at a time), 14ga. leg, 20ga. leg, (2) 14ga. legs... in all cases lowered system performance. In each scenario, sonically the system sounded different and worse than with just the twisted 11AWG. Then tried adding a 20ga. solid core 5N Cardas silver, which threw the system tonal balance off. In all scenarios what was heard was immediate and obvious.

As part of the above experiment I also tried disconnecting the 11ga., so no box attached. Also tried just one 14ga. leg, instead of the twisted dual 14ga (11AWG). With one 14ga. only, there was a loss of body and bass slam, lower resolution across the frequency spectrum. Disconnecting the box completely negatively impacted the system a little more similar to with just one 14ga.

See how much time and different materials are required to properly experiment and come up with superior cable builds? Another factor is different builds are likely going to tonally shift systems. Meaning like how interconnect electrical properties based on design (geometries, conductor spacing, dielectrics, metal materials and purity) change how they effect a system tonally. Sorry, long winded but this is a deep and complicated subject.

Yes it’s incredible how everything matters. I used too many teflon for the wire entering the box. The sound was off, didn’t like it. Next I bypassed the teflon using the black shoelace going through the box and we were in a totally different world. I now am standard using cable jackets made of pure cotton (white or black). I recently had another hickup. I wrapped teflon around the connector (under the carbon shell) to help prevent the bare connection from oxidising. One tiny piece of teflon touched the bare wire. The sound was not good and after alot of unfulfilling tweaking I finally found the problem. I completely dismanteled the box (this was a grounding box with a double direct wire passthrough for left and right rca channels simultaneously, so two twisted pairs) I remade the box with a binding post and must say what I hear right now after one day only is much better. I have one other box here with double passthrough and will rebuild this box too with a binding post. I will post my experiences from this as I am under the impression double direct passthrough does not work well. Has someone experienced/tried this also?

 

[cdacosta]

Yes it’s incredible how everything matters. I used too many teflon for the wire entering the box. The sound was off, didn’t like it. Next I bypassed the teflon using the black shoelace going through the box and we were in a totally different world. I now am standard using cable jackets made of pure cotton (white or black). I recently had another hickup. I wrapped teflon around the connector (under the carbon shell) to help prevent the bare connection from oxidising. One tiny piece of teflon touched the bare wire. The sound was not good and after alot of unfulfilling tweaking I finally found the problem. I completely dismanteled the box (this was a grounding box with a double direct wire passthrough for left and right rca channels simultaneously, so two twisted pairs) I remade the box with a binding post and must say what I hear right now after one day only is much better. I have one other box here with double passthrough and will rebuild this box too with a binding post. I will post my experiences from this as I am under the impression double direct passthrough does not work well. Has someone experienced/tried this also?

You replaced the two directly wired 11AWG twisted pairs with a binding post. Are you running two 11AWG cables from the binding post, or only one? I am trying to understand if you changed the install at component end?

 

[cdacosta]

I also take vibration control seriously, so it also consists of two layers. But they are of the same technology: carbon fiber.
For this project, I benefit of the guidance of @rodthebod . He is a professional with 35 years of experience in acoustic isolation, and is a member of our forum.
Soon, I'll complete this project for all my system. I'll post then a report to share my experience.

I just ordered a 100mm x 250mm x 5mm thick carbon fiber plate to experiment with. To try different platform ideas for under the ground box. I tried with 1/4" pine yesterday. With a few different isolation and decoupling footers, but the performance was worse than just the .75" silicon 1/2 dome footers I use under all my DIY boxes. Will report if I find any revelations from this.

EDIT: Tried with 1/4" and 1/2" pine