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I hate it when the wife is thinking....

similost

similost

Rockin and Rollin....
.....

um. wow.. how do I explain this....

I know a few people might remember when I was questioning my house power...


I'm running a few amps, and a lot of other gear...

Now I'm getting ready to add a couple more amps....

The lights already give us a great flicker show when I crank it up., and I'm going to add two more 100w amps, and I was thininking about a couple more coolie things to add...

Then the real question came....

"Do you think the power in the house will really deal with it...."

****!

What to do... I rent, and i know the Lord wont' upgrade on my whim...

Suks my wife thinks further ahead than I do...
 
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juut be carefull when you tap into the main power grid. i hear its a shocking experience...ok enough joking on my part....see if you can find out what guage the wires are , going to your plug ins from the main service. and what amperage is your switches at the fuse box or whatever theyre called. if theyre not 20 amps see if your land lord wouldnt mind having them changed to 20 ampers. THAT IS ONLY IF YOUR HOUSE WIRES ARE OF THE CORRECT GUAGE.
 
Get some really heavy gauge extension cord, run it from other circuits in the house. Or even better, your neighbors house. :D
 
i think 12 guage house wiring will support a 20 amp circuit(just remembered what theyre called) breaker. easy way to find out is to first turn off the breaker for the plugin yure looking at. then taking the cover off, and pulling out the plug. and just see how thick the wire is.
 
At the circuit breaker box, just add another 20amp breaker (if there is room) with its own dedicated line (same guage or lower), running to an outlet used only for your amplifiers. The only problem is (of course) that you are renting and don't want to try to run any new wires under the house or through the walls, without cutting or drilling new holes. The other problem with just replacing the 15A to a 20A circuit breaker, is it may feed other outlets instead of just the one you want to use for your amplifiers.
 
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cademan said:
At the circuit breaker box, just add another 20amp breaker (if there is room) with its own dedicated line (same guage or lower), running to an outlet used only for your amplifiers. The only problem is (of course) that you are renting and don't want to try to run any new wires under the house or through the walls, without cutting or drilling new holes. The other problem with just replacing the 15A to a 20A circuit breaker, is it may feed other outlets instead of just the one you want to use for your amplifiers.
Click to expand...


This is pretty much what I was going to advise: running a single, dedicated circuit just for your audio gear is not really expensive. In fact, if you have a cooperative electrician they can simply install the fuse and a couple feet of line with a socket, and you can run the rest of the wire (extension-cord-like) yourself, taping it under/along the carpet along the wall or otherwise making it as inconspicuous as possible. This way, you can even take the wire with you when you move later!

Alternatively, if you already have a heavy-duty circuit for things like washing machines, try running your gear off of that. You won't want to run both the washer and the stereo at the same time, but you may be able to work around that.

If the wiring in your place really is inadequate, you can't just overload the circuits. But perhaps by doing the above, or drawing off of more than one house circuit, or choosing carefully which components you run at any one time, you can manage.

Good luck!
 
If it's not blowing the fuse, or tripping the breaker, then you should be fine LOL... if it blows a fuse, put some tin foil in there. If it's tripping the breaker, krazy glue the breaker switch to the ON position LOL
 
wilkes85 said:
If it's not blowing the fuse, or tripping the breaker, then you should be fine LOL... if it blows a fuse, put some tin foil in there. If it's tripping the breaker, krazy glue the breaker switch to the ON position LOL
Click to expand...

I like your way of thinking....
 
I had to deal with this in a few rentals over the years. It was worth getting an electrician to run the new circuit(s). Once I tapped into a garbage disposal dedicated circuit 'cause it was nearby, once I went right from the breaker panel, once I tapped off a laundry circuit 'cause it wasn't likely to be used while the studio was running.

Almost every rental I've ever had I went around & replaced all the crappy outlets with better ones, putting the originals back in when I moved out.

je
 
James, where is your circuit box? In the garage? Is the part of your basement under your living room finished? If there is a path that is easy excessable running a new circuit is not that big a deal. I have added new circuits in our house and if I can do it I know you can.
 
As others have mentioned , Dedicated lines are the answer..... How do you know you are pushing 15 amps? How did you measure it? Most likely lights are on the same circuit and the circuit is long with a lot of junction boxes....

A lot of the need for heavy gauge circuits are related to speaker efficiency. Highly efficient speakers place much less demand on the power amps, no matter the size of the power amp. Lower efficiency speakers on large power amps put much more strain on the AC Power....

I have a dedicated 20 amp 240V 10 gauge circuit for the amps ( they can run on 240V - I have 2000 watts total ) and a dedicate 20amp 120V 10 gauge circuit for the rest of the gear ( preamps, tuner, CDP, DAC....). I never get any voltage sag on the 240V circuit driving my low efficiency Ohm Fs, which have a low 87DBSP efficiency rating.

I used to dim the lights on a shared 120V circuit.

The heavier the gauge the better for large amps.....

If you are like MasterLu in the Mac crowd with 24,000 watts.....then you need a dedicated Power Company line just for the sound system.....


I just read you are renting....not sure how I missed that the first time.....

I WOULD STILL TRY FOR A DEDICATED LINE OR GET A REGENERATING POWER CONDITIONER .... Like an Exact Power or a PS Audio...they regenerate the AC signal to a correct 120Vs and will not sag under a load of 1500watts ( Depending on the model....). They will still cause the lights to dim on a shared circuit, but the amps will get full power..... I use an exact power unit for the preamp, CDP, DAC & Tuner because power company sucks in the summer.... You can find a used Regenerating Power Conditioner for a reasonable price.

Don't bother with a none regenerating conditioner as they will not help the AMPs if the lights are Dimming......

johnk
 
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Swapping a 15A breaker for a 20A is illegal and will kill you, and here's how;

The wiring in the walls of your house, by code, is 14awg because it can handle 15A plus safety, or else it will heat up too much. Also if the house is older than 30, I'm willing to bet that it's cloth-and-paper covered wire, which burns really, really well. You need 12awg for 20A in your walls.

FYI.


Philip.
 
thefragger said:
Swapping a 15A breaker for a 20A is illegal and will kill you, and here's how;

The wiring in the walls of your house, by code, is 14awg because it can handle 15A plus safety, or else it will heat up too much. Also if the house is older than 30, I'm willing to bet that it's cloth-and-paper covered wire, which burns really, really well. You need 12awg for 20A in your walls.

FYI.


Philip.
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So true! One thing to keep in mind with electrical work is to do it right and by code.
 
Step up to the Plate and buy that house! Then you can have a couple of dedicated 20 amp lines to the music room! Heck in this economy you can get a Smokin deal! :D
 
Definetly buy a home of your own. Best thing you could ever do, if it is possible and you can swing it. If not, run your amps to a different plug on a different breaker. Make life simple. First of all, you rent, anything you do, you need to check with your landlord.
Before you change the plug to a 20 amp plug, the wire must be 12 ga.!!! 14ga is not heavy enough for a 20 amp plug.

I did all the wiring on my addition and followed the code to exact specifcation.
 
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All in jest folks

wilkes85 said:
If it's not blowing the fuse, or tripping the breaker, then you should be fine LOL... if it blows a fuse, put some tin foil in there. If it's tripping the breaker, krazy glue the breaker switch to the ON position LOL
Click to expand...

This is the quickest way to get a really HOT SYSTEM

Personally I like to use older copper pennies.
:D
 
Well, you don't have all of your equipment on at the same time, so what's the problem? You're only drawing amps on the stuff that is running, not the stuff that is turned off.

And yeah, no swapping 15 amp breakers for 20's. Thats asking for a wire's sheathing to over heat and melt before you trip your breaker! And as mentioned, it is illegal and not up to code.... I just sat through a 10 week class dealing with nothing BUT home wiring installation and electrical code.....
 
My 15 amp is a guess.. I do know the circuit is 15 amps though. I have a hell of a lot plugged into it, and most of it is on all the time. Running 3 amps on it now, and will have 5 amps... not to mention the LCD TV... Most of the upstairs for some stupid reason is on the same circuit. 3 rooms...

I'm liking David's idea. Never thought of that... I do have the basement and electric right under the living room that is in a different circuit, and has almost nothing on it. It wouldn't take much to fish a new wire up from there and just add another outlet in the livingroom wall next to the existing one.
 
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