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December 7, 2021 - 1:11am

#1

Laine Flack

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Joined: Dec 6 2021 - 2:31am

Help! Ground Loop Interference

Hi All,

I really hope that someone can help me.

I have an in ceiling subwoofer that is picking up mains hum from the other power cables that run in the same loft space.

I've purchased some flexible metal conduit and run the subwoofer cable through it to see if this makes any difference, but it doesn't seem to change anything.

The flexible metal conduit is not grounded. Would grounding help?

I've ordered a ground loop filter to try and assist, but beginning to run out of options.

Would shielded speaker cable help?

Any advice or guidance would be gratefully received.

December 7, 2021 - 6:48am

#2

geoffkait

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Joined: Apr 29 2008 - 5:10am

Always run power cables and

Always run power cables and other cables at 90 degree angles to each other, never in parallel. That should greatly reduce electromagnetic interference.

December 9, 2021 - 4:06pm

#3

manunkind

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Joined: Apr 27 2019 - 7:27am

The flexible metal conduit

Hello,

Recently I rearranged my setup, and started to notice that my turntable RCA cables started to pick up strange EM interference. Like geoffkait said, I tried to distance the power cable from my turntable (Rega RP1) from the signal cables- it helped a bit, but didn't solve the problem entirely. I got that flexible metal conduit and fed the cable through it- it worsened the interference. Now Rega, for whatever reason, does not have a dedicated ground cable- so i ran a wire from the flexible conduit to the ground connector in my amplifier- and the EM noise all but vanished.