Thread: Aligning Components For Same AC Polarity

Well, not sure how crazy, especially since this is a 2-year old post with no responses, but I'll bite...

My front end components are on a dedicated 15A circuit, and my amps and subs are on a dedicated 20A circuit. I made sure both circuits were wired the same way. I just received an Ideal 61-164 AC tester and it turns out my outlets have the hot and neutral swapped on both circuits.

My question to the collective is whether it is worth rewiring both circuits to swap the hot and neutral? The analyzer shows that there is 33V between ground and neutral, which doesn't seem like a good thing? Impedance for both ground and neutral is 0.01 Ohm.

My system sounds very good as-is, but I'm down the power cable/conditioner rabbit hole, so am trying to assess whether I can make things better yet.

Thoughts?

I suggest making the hot and neutral correct. It isn't relevant to some electrical items, but it is a safety feature in others. I don't think it will change the sound.

Capitol,
Thanks. I don't look forward to it, but I agree I think it's best.

Did you do the wiring yourself? If so, anyone can goof, that's why there are testers. If you fix it yourself, it could be wrong either in the circuit breaker box or in the wall. It is easiest to check and fix in the box. Naturally, it is most likely to be in the wall, where it is a pain to fix--the heavy-gauge wires are hard to move around in a small space. If an electrician did the job, he or she should fix it for free. I've installed the hot and neutral backwards in my house, but so have professional electricians. I had a bathroom redone where this happened, and also where the plumber installed hot and cold backwards. Easy to fix under the sink, but the toilet was being flushed with hot water! Fortunately, I was able to point out a spot in the room on the floor below where the pipes could be accessed so they didn't have to tear out tile, they just had to do a bit of fancy crossing of copper pipes.

I did the 20A circuit myself, and installed the 15A Hubbell hospital outlets, so no-one to blame but me. In my defense, I did make sure both circuits are consistently wired, but didn't have a polarity tester (nor even thought it would matter). Swapping the 20A circuit won't be too bad as access to the wire feeding the outlets is accessible, but the 15A outlets are in the back of my electronics closet and a pain to get to. The 15A circuit only has 12 AWG so at least it will be easier to manipulate the wires than the 10 AWG 20A circuit.

The best (and easiest) would be to swap the wires at the panel, but I'm not confident in working on a hot panel. I'll probably get an electrician buddy to swap it.

If you or someone else works on the panel, it is easy to shut off most panels before working. If the wiring is correct at the panel (white neutral, black or colors hot), it isn't recommended to switch it, as there will then be wires in the walls that are backward. If you decide to go that route, though, a piece of white electrical tape wrapped around the end of the black/colored wire and black tape wrapped around the end of the white wire at least alerts the next person about what has been done. You have a 50/50 chance, though, that the tape won't be necessary! And it certainly is not a thing that you have to rush on, especially if all your gear uses two-prong non-polarized plugs. I had some three-phase circuits installed at work (I'm an experimental physicist) where the electrician messed up the phases, so even pros do it.

Last weekend I reversed polarity on the dedicated 20A circuit. A few key takeaways:
1. As I remembered all audio gear is on a dedicated circuit. I'm not sure why, but a few months ago I convinced myself that I had a 15A for front end and 20A for amps/subs. So by swapping polarity at the first amp outlet I fixed polarity for the entire audio chain.
2. I checked noise with the Entec on the first outlet before I connected the rest of the circuit. I'm picking up quite a bit of AM noise on the outlet, which means that the 10 AWG twisted Romex I used is ineffective at blocking radiative EFI.
3. The Hydra Triton and Typhon QR eliminate audible AM, but only make about a 20 point reduction in the noise measurement on the Entec. Also, the noise is only reduced at the source components where the Hydras are installed. They don't seem to have any effect on the outlets further up the chain.
4. Reversing polarity reduced the voltage between neutral and ground to basically zero. The instantaneous short circuit current is over 700A with the TWL power cords.

No noticeable change in sound quality from swapping polarity.