i am adding a sub panel in my house exclusivly for my media room. The only thing that will be feed from it will be the components in the media closet. I know it probably sounds like overkill to put in a 100 amp sub panel but I really want some future flexability. My question is how would i isolate the grounding for this panel so it will not mix with the other systems in my house. The equipment im using is very sensitive to shared grounding systems. the panel is approximately 75 feet from the 400 amp main. also is there something about the amount of breakers in the panel that would require me to have a main breaker in this sub panel? thanks for the help in advance. John
sub panel for media room
- Thread starter massivek
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ryan_618
Senior Member
- Location
- Salt Lake City, Utah
Re: sub panel for media room
If the house is using NM cable (romex) and plastic boxes, you have already addressed the issue of shared grounds.
As far as the main breaker goes, there is no requirement for x amount of breakers to require a main.
If the house is using NM cable (romex) and plastic boxes, you have already addressed the issue of shared grounds.
As far as the main breaker goes, there is no requirement for x amount of breakers to require a main.
petersonra
Senior Member
- Location
- Northern illinois
- Occupation
- engineer
Re: sub panel for media room
Keep in mind you cannot totally isolate this panelboard from the rest of your systems. It still has to be connected to your home's grounding system (usually the ground bar in the main panel), that all the other grounds are connected to.
If you run romex from the main panel to the subpanel and then use all plastic boxes as another poster suggested, you will have the best "isolation" you can get.
Route the new cables as far away from any sources of electrical noise and whatever feeds those sources (motors, dimmers, flourescent fixtures, etc) as is practical.
You might be tempted to put the whole thing in metal conduit to reduce noise even farther, but in reality metal conduit is not an effective high frequency shield and may actually act as an antenna, more so then Romex would.
You may also want to consider adding a whole house transient suppresser. The suppresser should be installed at your service panel by someone qualifed to do so. this will give you fairly good protection against electrical transients entering your home. You should probably forget adding power strip type protectors as they are generally not especially effective.
You may want to try adding an RFI filter to the power feeding your equipment, as its just as likely "noise" is coming in on the power wires as it is on the ground wire. this is something you might want to experiment with to see if it improves anything.
lastly, consider this. many times problems are blamed on "bad" grounds that are really caused by other issues such as poor equipment design or long lead length.
[ October 27, 2004, 10:37 AM: Message edited by: petersonra ]
Keep in mind you cannot totally isolate this panelboard from the rest of your systems. It still has to be connected to your home's grounding system (usually the ground bar in the main panel), that all the other grounds are connected to.
If you run romex from the main panel to the subpanel and then use all plastic boxes as another poster suggested, you will have the best "isolation" you can get.
Route the new cables as far away from any sources of electrical noise and whatever feeds those sources (motors, dimmers, flourescent fixtures, etc) as is practical.
You might be tempted to put the whole thing in metal conduit to reduce noise even farther, but in reality metal conduit is not an effective high frequency shield and may actually act as an antenna, more so then Romex would.
You may also want to consider adding a whole house transient suppresser. The suppresser should be installed at your service panel by someone qualifed to do so. this will give you fairly good protection against electrical transients entering your home. You should probably forget adding power strip type protectors as they are generally not especially effective.
You may want to try adding an RFI filter to the power feeding your equipment, as its just as likely "noise" is coming in on the power wires as it is on the ground wire. this is something you might want to experiment with to see if it improves anything.
lastly, consider this. many times problems are blamed on "bad" grounds that are really caused by other issues such as poor equipment design or long lead length.
[ October 27, 2004, 10:37 AM: Message edited by: petersonra ]
al hildenbrand
Senior Member
- Location
- Minnesota
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- Electrical Contractor, Electrical Consultant, Electrical Engineer
Re: sub panel for media room
On a side note. . .the vision of a media room in a house using 24 KiloWatts, or thereabouts, yields the image of the Kleenex boxes at each chair to staunch the blood coming from my ears.
That's an excellent point. Signal quality issues, created by undesireable phenomena on the media equipment signal cable "grounds", are rarely related to the electrical power supply grounding system when the premises wiring system is correctly bonded just once, at the service disconnect.
On a side note. . .the vision of a media room in a house using 24 KiloWatts, or thereabouts, yields the image of the Kleenex boxes at each chair to staunch the blood coming from my ears.
luke warmwater
Senior Member
Re: sub panel for media room
I have a bass shaker mounted to the bottom of my sofa to get the 'feel' of the low end. It can play tricks on your stomache.
Al, thanks for the visual.
I have a bass shaker mounted to the bottom of my sofa to get the 'feel' of the low end. It can play tricks on your stomache.
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