Reply To: Basic principles in electrical system design for studios

April 7, 2023 at 3:20 pm #5725
Norman Varney
Moderator

    Ted,

    You are happily on the right track! I would say that much of this is preventative and conditional to the scenario. I try to get measurements before designing a system to address existing conditions, and/or incorporate a separately derived system, etc. For example is armored conduit a needed expense in your environment? I like to overkill everything electrical to be safe and sanitary.

    I do believe in physical isolation. In fact, just last month I installed a Google Nest wifi pod near  electronic cables behind my rack. When I fired up the audio system I heard an unfamiliar noise. Turned out the cat6 cable has interfering and injecting noise into the system, until I moved the cable away from other cables. Note, my AC is dedicated, cables, dressing, contacts, etc. are all pretty high-end. With electrical systems I design my goal is for a minimum:

    1. Ground Resistance of < 5 Ohm at grounding electrode conductor
    2. Peak Current Capability of >1000 amps on each dedicated circuit
    3. Voltage Distortion  of <5%
    4. Common Mode Noise of <10mv
    5. Normal Mode Noise of <50mv
    6. Harmonic Content of <3% 3rd, with nothing above
    7. Electrical isolation throughout.