How to Properly Ground Pioneer SPEC-1, SPEC-2, and Other Gear?

[cerda_daniel]

Hi everyone,

I have a vintage Pioneer setup, including the SPEC-1 preamp, SPEC-2 power amp, SG-9800 equalizer, CT-F1000 cassette deck, and RT-707 reel-to-reel.

I've noticed static on the front panels, especially when I touch them. I suspect this might be due to improper grounding. (NO HUM OR NOISES)

• Should I ground the chassis of each component? If so, how should I do it?
• Would replacing the power cables with grounded (three-prong) cables help? If so, where exactly should I connect the ground wire—directly to the chassis?
• What’s the recommended way to properly ground these vintage units?

I’d really appreciate any advice on the best way to solve this issue. Thanks in advance!

 

[Blue Shadow]

Static in low humidity months is common. Do not replace power cords. You shouldn't need to use ground connections on the gear to each other.

Couple ways to solve this, touch a grounded piece of metal before touching the gear. I have a preamp that has the phono ground going to the ground pin of the AC and I can touch a wire connected here, but I don't seem to have a lot of static. Tis preamp is from 1992 and came from the factory with the three-wire plug.

There are ground pads you can make and install discussed on the web.

Others have their way of handling this, including using a humidifier in the home or room to get the humidity up to 50% or so.

 

[cerda_daniel]

Thanks for sharing, Blue Shadow. I have mine mounted on a rack as well, so using ground pads isn’t really an option.

I came across this:
Puritan GroundMaster City

I was wondering if I could plug this into the AC and use it to ground the chassis of each piece of equipment. Do you think this would be a good solution? Have you (or anyone else) tried something similar?

Looking forward to your thoughts!

 

[calman46]

I have a spec 1&4 setup I use these in low humidity. You just hold it and touch it to something metal. The little LCD screen lights up and discharges you.

 

[cerda_daniel]

Thank you guys!

 

[Blue Shadow]

. I have mine mounted on a rack as well, so using ground pads isn’t really an option.

You just need to get your static charge dissipated before you touch the metal system. Easy enough to get something to do that and attach it to your rig in a way that it is convenient to use and isolated from the rig to be cable to discharge your static electricity. It is not more than a buck worth of stuff to make one.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/how-do-you-discharge-static.908344/

 

[cerda_daniel]

@Blue Shadow, do you think this can work? to ground the rack?

 

[Blue Shadow]

That device is talking about ground noise, not static. Just get one of the solutions in the thread. A wire, a resistor and connect it to ground in the electrical system and a place to touch it before touching the rig.

 

[cerda_daniel]

thanks!

 

[raj5001]

Hi All,

I am working on a Marantz cassette deck and I was able to fix loud static pops by grounding myself before touching the deck, as discussed above. I am still noticing a background hiss during silent parts of the tape. I have found that grounding the line output to chassis ground completely removes this hiss. This bypasses the 1nf capacitor that grounds the line output. Is there a reason this capacitor grounding is causing so much background noise?

This is from google "cassette deck is grounded with a capacitor primarily to filter out high-frequency noise (acting as a low-pass filter) and to block Direct Current (DC) offset from entering downstream equipment. This "coupling" or "bypass" capacitor ensures that only the audio signal passes through, while protecting circuits from interference."