Power. Mmm... power.

[Virtual Jim]

I'm curious to see if anyone here uses power regulation and/or surge protectors on their gear. If so, why?

[The Geoff]

I *always* use one when I'm playing outside of my own house as I don't know the quality of electrical workmanship at the site.

 

This was prompted by the death some years ago, of Lesley Harvey,brother of Alex Harvey, and lead guitarist of 'Stone The Crows', on stage after shorting a circuit through his chest via his guitar and the microphone.

 

I knew Lesley slightly, and it had a marked effect on my outlook.

 

Geoff

[Kramer Ferrington III.]

Originally posted by Geoff B.:

This was prompted by the death some years ago, of Lesley Harvey,brother of Alex Harvey, and lead guitarist of 'Stone The Crows', on stage after shorting a circuit through his chest via his guitar and the microphone.

Oh, wow... is that Alex Harvey as in The Sensational Alex Harvey Band?

 

I've always been curious about them.

 

What's a good "intro" album for that band?

[The Geoff]

Yup - the very same.

 

I think there's a local Glasgow firm re-issuing SAHB and Maggie Bell albums - I have one - hang on amo while I go upstairs & find it - yes - it's a double album with SAHB Live and 'The Penthouse Tapes' on it, both copyrite Mercury 1982 & Universal, and Mountain 1976.

 

The only numbers I can find on them are:

 

ICO0268 BIEM/MCPS 514 414-2

ICO0268 BIEM/MCPS 514 413-2

 

Now, my eyesight is poor these days, those letters were tiny and I was wearing two pairs of glasses to see them, so the 'O's might be '0's and the 'C's might be 'G's, or even vice versa!!

 

There are quite a few of these available.

 

I bought this in a very good & knowledgeable record shop next to DeCourcey's Arcade, off Byres Road in Glasgow - called The Music Zone - these boys know every CD on their shelves - I got Vinegar Joe in there. They have all sorts of unusual & jazz stuff there too.

[Kramer Ferrington III.]

Cool. I've just ordered it.

[The Geoff]

I saw Alex twice in the 60's with the Big Soul Band - I never saw SAHB live, only on TV.

 

He's an acquired taste. Good luck.

 

I saw Les play with Alex once. He broke a string and restrung & tuned while playing a solo, using the tuning glissando in the solo !!!!!!!!!!!?????!!!.

 

He was truly an amazing guitarist right up there with ANYONE you could name. He was cut short well before fulfilling his promise.

 

Alex spent 4 years playing in the stage band for 'HAIR' back in the 60s/70s before coming back and forming SAHB.

 

G.

[Bluesape]

Originally posted by Geoff B.:

I *always* use one when I'm playing outside of my own house as I don't know the quality of electrical workmanship at the site.

 

This was prompted by the death some years ago, of Lesley Harvey,brother of Alex Harvey, and lead guitarist of 'Stone The Crows', on stage after shorting a circuit through his chest via his guitar and the microphone.

 

I knew Lesley slightly, and it had a marked effect on my outlook.

 

Geoff

WOW!

 

I only thought that could happen if water were somehow involved. We have a different voltage here, but I imagine that it's the amperage that can be dangerous when shorting in your chest.

[Corner Pocket]

Bluesape,

 

Very roughly described, European Electrical service is twice the voltage, (220 VAC vs. 110 VAC), and half the current. A typical European household outlet will be 7.5 amp service, and ours are 15 amp.

 

I've taken a shock from the guitar in my right hand, across my body and out through the bass in my left hand due to a grounding problem. I had grabbed the bass to stop it falling over. I had to KICK the bass out of my hand to get rid of it, as my hand locked onto the neck because of the electricity.

 

It scared the crap out of my parents in the audience. I shook it off and finished the gig. The bass still has shoe polish on it, (over 20 years later), and it did NOT go out of tune when kicked.

 

I ALWAYS check the service before pluggin in, and use VOM meter to check for ground issues between mic stands and guitars and such.

 

Peace,

 

Paul

[Bluesape]

Wow. I've gotten little shocks from holding 2 guitars that weren't well gounded, but never anything of the magnitude that happened to you.

[Gabriel E.]

I use a power regulator. It makes the amps sound more consistent and protects against spikes and drops.

 

I measured the voltage in my old house and it ran anywhere from 106 t0 125VAC.

[Flashback]

Well, my mixer the VS-890 is not only a big computer but also contains a hard drive. So I do and highly recommend gear of this nature to be plugged into a UPS.

 

Anything that does digital processing like Multi-Effect Pedals, Drum Machines, Mixers and the like I have always felt better about having them feed from a UPS. I dont know how much of a problem it is because Ive always protected the stuff, but my main concern here is speaker / ear damage. A spike or brown-out could conceivably throw the circuits into a disallowed state where most any frequency at any amplitude could be generated. Or I may just be paranoid.

 

PA and Guitar Amps go straight into the wall. I would love to feed them from a conditioner but the only ones Ive used that I really trust are the industrial kind, like 80 Lbs. and $2500

[Kramer Ferrington III.]

Originally posted by rockincyanblues:

Bluesape,

 

Very roughly described, European Electrical service is twice the voltage, (220 VAC vs. 110 VAC), and half the current. A typical European household outlet will be 7.5 amp service, and ours are 15 amp.

 

I've taken a shock from the guitar in my right hand

yeah, I've been told that here in Italy, and as recently as the 1970s, guitarists used to wear an antistatic bracelet on their right wrist as protection against the unreliable current. I find it hard to believe, and am not too sure how it worked, but anything's possible. Maybe James-italy knows more details.

[picker]

Where ca you get a voltage regulator, and how much do they cost?

[BluesWithoutBlame]

You gotta think...even in well regulated grids like in Chicago, play in a basement and grab a support beam (metal) or lean against it while touching guitar strings you'll get 100v through you.

 

Here in europe, as stated, it is more voltage,less current, but more than enough anyway.

I used to love the feature on my old Ampeg VT-22, polarity switch...if I went to sing and got zapped a little on the lips from the mic, I switched polarity on the amp and no problem.

[BluesWithoutBlame]

PIcker...our sigs seem to be themed around the same concept...but not conceptually, more idealized which is not ideal.

[Flashback]

Vince, Im glad you find that hard to believe!

 

ESD bracelets (or the cable to them) contain a 1 Mega-Ohm resistor to pass electrostatic charge while keeping the operator isolated from ground so they dont get zapped (through the bracelets ground wire) if they contact a hot circuit.

 

If one was to defeat the resistor then theyre tied directly to ground which is the Worst thing one could do!

 

Folks should stay as Un-grounded as possible. Plug all their gear into the same circuit/ground as possible (yeah right). And if one doesnt have a meter to test for voltage and must use their body, always use the Back of your hand to touch a circuit. Your reflex action will be working in your favor.

[skipclone 1]

There`s several good articles online about this-in a live situation NEVER let the help plug things in for you-do it yourself and check every signal path, make sure all the polarities are what they should be. There are any number of boxes-the VHT valvulator which I have is one-which have regulated power outs which can drive your effects pedals or whatever. I in turn plug that into a surge protector. I don`t see where you have to spend a ton of dollars over this but if there`s added protection, maybe so.

[BillWelcome Home Studios]

Originally posted by Geoff B.:

This was prompted by the death some years ago, of Lesley Harvey,brother of Alex Harvey, and lead guitarist of 'Stone The Crows', on stage after shorting a circuit through his chest via his guitar and the microphone.

 

 

Geoff

Cool, but the presence or absence of a power conditioner didn't have anything to do with the accident. That tragedy was terrible. As it was explained to me (back at the time) this was a ground potential issue. The same ground potental that sometimes gives you a shock when you touch the mic with your lips. For many years I carried a wiggy in my guitar case and always touched the strings and the mic with it before I grabbed anything. There should only be one path to ground, and you should not ever be the connection that creates two paths to ground.

 

If by "power conditioners" you guys are talking about things like the Furman power strips, these do not much more than a $7 Home Depot power strip (basically, just MOV protection). To really have off the shelf power protection for your gear, you need something like an AR-117, 1220, Equi=Tech balanced power, or something similar. These devices all seem to be up around $500 plus.

 

Just two summers ago I watched a kid hit the deck when he went to sing. The blast put him right down. Turned out that he had recently had his amp serviced. I put a meter on the amp chassis, touched it to the ground of the quad box supplying power to the amp, and got a full 117 volts AC. That means that this guy had 117 volts of potental when he held the strings, and the mic grounded that potential, allowing current to flow. One of the shortest (if you'll pardon the pun) sets that I've witnessed.

 

Bill

[fantasticsound]

10 years ago I mixed a show at Opryland Hotel, party entertainment for a huge corporate event. The hotel had a main system hooked up in the brand new, Delta Ballroom. Capacity for this type of event is 5,000, but there were probably 4,000 in the room. I set up my system as a monitor power amp driven by their FOH console, a hundred feet or so from stage.

 

In the middle of the show I see the guitar player fall backward and the system went silent. This particular player leans way back when soloing, so I thought he'd finally tripped himself and fallen down. But the rest of the band was silent.

 

I ran to the stage to find he was ok, but was yelling about being shocked by the mic as they went to sing after the solo. Like an idiot he insisted on showing me the electrical current by leaning into the SM58 grill with his strings until it arc'd a bright blue lightning bolt.

 

That shut down the show until the house electrician arrived. As I'd already figured, there was 117VAC hot from the mic to whoever touched it, and was also present at most of the other mics.

 

We traced it to a quad box onstage. An internal wire had come loose when an amp, leaning against the drum riser, had vibrated away enough to fall over, knocking the quad box. The loose wire was on the output to the next quad, and the loose wire had crossed hot to ground for everyone on the rest of the quads. Somehow it didn't fry the keyboard players rig at all. But the artist burned his finger on his electric fiddle volume pot. (He liked to wrap his finger around the pot and move it when he's not playing and had grounded his little finger to the metal shaft.) The guitar player's lips were shocked as was the keyboard players. The guitar player had taken the brunt of it. (Must've been the first person to complete the circuit. We removed the quad and the gig resumed.

 

Not one of my favorite moments, but it shows the need for proper inspection of all your gear, especially electrical.

 

As for protection, I would definitely use a surge protector to protect against what I just described. If you can afford it, I'd suggest a high quality voltage regulator, but quality costs. You can use a cheap, computer voltage regulator, but better to get a Furman AR-1215 or the like. And that ain't cheap. The regulator is especially important if you know the grid in your area (or the area you perform in) is unreliable.

 

Originally posted by BluesWithoutBlame:

You gotta think...even in well regulated grids like in Chicago, play in a basement and grab a support beam (metal) or lean against it while touching guitar strings you'll get 100v through you.

Not exactly. Electrical systems are just that. Systems. And every refrigerator, clothes dryer, etc. on the system can create havoc for sensitive electronics elsewhere on the system if they aren't isolated well. Plus, OSHA ground is not necessarily well grounded. Take enough measurements and you can find voltage on "ground" because of electrical items that are poorly grounded internally. 5v - 10v or more in some cases. But 100v? You have a serious problem if you can find 100v between your gear and a grounded beam.

[BillWelcome Home Studios]

Yeah as soon as we got the kid taken care of and in the hands of paramedics, I stared checking the systems to see where the problem was. I expected some litigation, so I wanted to make sure that all the ducks were in a row. I wanted to make sure that all the vendors, promoters, and others involved were clear on what happened and why, so that no unfounded accusations and resulting bad blood would occur. I opened the AC distro supply snake and made sure that the quad was wired correctly, checked the mic to the quad, checked the Camlok connections to the distro, etc. When I hit the amp, I was surprised at the voltage on the chassis. What qualified amp repair tech could make such a mistake? Well, -anyone- can make a mistake. Thank goodness the guy wasn't seriously hurt. But the lesson is clear... carry a wiggy. 2 bucks.

 

Bill

[skipclone 1]

Just to be clear, there is a difference between bottom of the barrel power strips-these are nothing but portable outlets that allow you to plug more things onto a single socket-and surge protectors which usually have some kind of LED which lights up if a voltage spike occurs. However there is no difference between the cheaper kind and the high-priced ones which are often recommended for computer gear and the like as long as they are rated at 15 amps.

[fantasticsound]

Originally posted by Bill@Welcome Home Studios:...If by "power conditioners" you guys are talking about things like the Furman power strips, these do not much more than a $7 Home Depot power strip (basically, just MOV protection). To really have off the shelf power protection for your gear, you need something like an AR-117, 1220, Equi=Tech balanced power, or something similar. These devices all seem to be up around $500 plus...

 

Bill

FYI - The AR-1215 is the successor to the AR-117, which hasn't been made for almost a decade IIRC.

[fantasticsound]

Originally posted by Bill@Welcome Home Studios:

...But the lesson is clear... carry a wiggy. 2 bucks.

 

Bill

Define wiggy. Are you referring to one of these?

 

(I answered my own question in searching for an image, although the one pictured is the Wiggy and costs almost $30. But I know what you mean regarding the $2 type.)

 

http://www.mytoolstore.com/klein/69115.jpg

 

This one's about $9

 

http://www.mytoolstore.com/klein/69136.jpg

[miroslav]

I don't have a "live" rig...

...but in my studio I use a pair of Juice Goose Voltage Regulators/Power Conditioners/Surge Protectors.

 

They are older, out-of-production units (Omega 20), 2-rack spaces high. They each provide 20 amps of clean, regulated voltage...each with about 10 outlets on the back.

They keep the voltage at a constant 110...from anythinng between 85 and 130 volts coming in.

 

All my gear is powered through them. I just run additional power strips off the outlets on the Juice Goose...and then all my gear is connected to the strips.

 

So everything is grounded at the same point...and each Goose gets it's power from an independent 20amp line that runs directly to the main breaker box.

 

No power problems.

[BillWelcome Home Studios]

Originally posted by fantasticsound:

The AR-1215 is the successor to the AR-117, which hasn't been made for almost a decade IIRC.

Right. Shows up on ebay, and because they are older, you can sometimes get them cheaper. The 1220 and 1215 seem to be the closest equivalents. ETA makes a similar box (or did ten years ago, which is probably the last time that I saw ANY ETA gear) as do some others. Real power conditioning is not cheap. For home use though, you can roll your own that may be a little cheaper and more powerful, but you REALLY need to know what you are doing.

 

Computer style UPSes may not be the best choice for reactive loads like amplifiers.

 

Balanced power all sort of rolls into this issue too, since the commercially available balanced power solutions also have good power conditioning. And the advantages to balanced power are pretty nice for single coil pickup guitar players.

 

Bill

[BillWelcome Home Studios]

I just bought two at a dollar store... obviously for a dollar. One has readouts for 110, 220, and 440 volts, which I find handy working in industrial situations. The other looks liek a screwdriver, with a sheath over the blade,a nd a wire coming out of the handle.

 

A real wiggy is just 2 wires and a lamp. You'll find a couple of different kinds, for AC and DC voltage. Interestingt hsat some manufacturer has adopted the name.

 

Bill

[skipclone 1]

Originally posted by Bill@Welcome Home Studios:

Originally posted by fantasticsound:

The AR-1215 is the successor to the AR-117, which hasn't been made for almost a decade IIRC.

Right. Shows up on ebay, and because they are older, you can sometimes get them cheaper. The 1220 and 1215 seem to be the closest equivalents. ETA makes a similar box (or did ten years ago, which is probably the last time that I saw ANY ETA gear) as do some others. Real power conditioning is not cheap. For home use though, you can roll your own that may be a little cheaper and more powerful, but you REALLY need to know what you are doing.

 

Computer style UPSes may not be the best choice for reactive loads like amplifiers.

 

Balanced power all sort of rolls into this issue too, since the commercially available balanced power solutions also have good power conditioning. And the advantages to balanced power are pretty nice for single coil pickup guitar players.

 

Bill

Oh THAT`s what you mean. I don`t know-I just don`t think those are necessary for most music situations.

Nice to have but an expensive extravagance, just know what you`re running through.

[LPCustom]

I've always used a tripp-lite power strip and conditioner for my amplifier and wall-warts. It's not cheap (about $125 back in the mid 80s). But I've never had a power related problem since I started using that. I don't use it at home, but I've started using a UPS at home for my musical gear since I found that one circuit in my music room is wired with hot and neutral inverted.

 

A UPS (as opposed to an SPS) is the best isolation you can get on wall power. It will guarantee that electric problems in the wall outlet will not reach your equipment since there is no direct connection between the output and the input.

[skipclone 1]

I remember coming home one day and found that an outlet on my surge supressor had MELTED-the LED was lit up, some errant power spike had blasted into the strip. I never did figure out where it came from. One outlet. Weird.

[Virtual Jim]

Wow. These responses are great, guys. Thanks!