BD-Design Swing speakers

[manisandher]

Yesterday I collected a used-but-mint pair of Bert's Swing speakers. I bought them last week from eBay for a ridiculously low price - the seller desperately needed to make space in his living room. They're playing right now and I can say they sound absolutely wonderful with my Sauermann monoblocks fed directly by the NOS1 (no preamp) connected via anti-cable balanced ICs.

But there is background noise coming out of the horns whenever the amps are switched on, at a level that is just audible in the listening position. The noise sounds mainly like hiss, with a slight amount of AC mains hum. However, I've tried running the whole system from the PurePower's battery supply, with nothing at all connected to the AC mains, and even then the noise remains exactly the same.

I have no experience with high-efficiency speakers, let alone 115dB/W@1m like the Swings! So a question for the rest of you with high efficiency speakers. What have you found that works to keep the noise down?

Any ideas most appreciated.

Mani.

[PeterSt]

Wlecome to the club (ehm, of noise reducers) !
haha

One thing helps here : it won't be the Sauermann's. Unless Gerd changed a couple of things.

What have you found that works to keep the noise down?

Hunt the source of it down.
Ah, oh. Yea. Funny me.
Still there is no other way ...

Oh, maybe switch off the BD30 part so that can be excluded as the source.

Hope you will find it !
Peter

[Nick]

Mani hi,

Congratulations what a great speaker, I would never have thought to look on eBay for such a rare and hi-end design.

Is the noise always there (eg with system just turned on without music playing) or is the noise something you get in the background while music is being played ?

My long term noise problem turned out to be my speaker cables acting as aerials and upsetting my NOS/gainclones. I would not rule out cables on the output side of your system, perhaps try moving them around to see if the noise level varies.

Out of interest what level of attenuation do you need to play at on the XXHE volume control to play loud ?

Cheers,

Nick.

[Scroobius]

Hi Mani,

Nice buy and welcome

to the club (ehm, of noise reducers) !

.

I would say I am certainly in that club!!!!. My problems were down to grounding arrangements in my amp. which are discussed in "Gainclone Heaven" thread. Not sure I can add anything and I would not have thought your amps would have grounding issues. Anyway best of luck and I would love to have a listen to your swinging new speakers sometime when sorted or even before sorted to see if we can collectively come up with something.

All the best

Paul

[PeterSt]

Mani, a maybe not so much obvious one :

When an interlink connector (and let's stop naming LS cables interlinks) has a bad connection, it will be very prone to working as a receiver antenna. This is noticable when you find that moving the interlink in front of PC or transformers and the like, changes the sound/loudness of the noise.

Since this especially counts for SE (RCA) interlinks, it may be an idea to investigate the BD30 in there and its internal wiring. Still I'd say that this won't be doing much to the mid-high, but when you can't find anything anyway ...

It *should* be all relatively easy for you because of the knowledge of the Sauermann's. So, my previous post maybe came across as trying to be funny only, but this knowlegde really should help because there's just no other noise-creating AUDIO DEVICE now. It can only be other things ...

I think I myself would start by getting the mains supply stuff out of the equation. Just for trials.
Shut down the remainder of the house rings.
*Know* that separate rings -no matter how- will transform noise by antenna working if you only allow the transmitters and receivers to be there (this is out of your control at first, but by reduction you will find out).
Don't only switch off and disconnect the devices not involved, but plug them out of the mains as well !! (this is crucial).

Regards,
Peter


PS: One more thing : back at the (Swings) time, Bert's system showed that noise just the same. Not only with the Swings - just the high sensivity horns. Things changed though, since we now know that we can 100% get rid of at least audible noise through 115dB sens. speakers. Bert's "Waves" don't exhibit a thing either. But :
It still can be that the BD30 of the time incurs for it. Bu I would doubt that.

[manisandher]

Thanks for your thoughts Nick.

Congratulations what a great speaker, I would never have thought to look on eBay for such a rare and hi-end design.

Yep, I'm chuffed to bits. I'll take quite a hit on selling my two-year-old Quads, but that's fine.

Is the noise always there (eg with system just turned on without music playing) or is the noise something you get in the background while music is being played ?

The noise is constant, irrespective of whether music is playing or not, or indeed whether the NOS1 is even connected to the Sauermann amps. It doesn't seem to be affected by in-built gainclone bass amps either.

My long term noise problem turned out to be my speaker cables acting as aerials and upsetting my NOS/gainclones. I would not rule out cables on the output side of your system, perhaps try moving them around to see if the noise level varies.

I strongly suspect my simple anti-cable LS cables are playing their part here. They are not tightly twisted pairs (yet) and must be pretty good at picking up RFI.

Out of interest what level of attenuation do you need to play at on the XXHE volume control to play loud ?

Between -30dB and -40dB, depending on recording level and time of day.

Cheers, Mani.

[manisandher]

... I would not have thought your amps would have grounding issues.

It's funny, but I think I could almost tell if it were a grounding issue just by the 'quality' of the noise... and I don't think it is. But I will explore grounding if all other avenues prove unsuccessful.

... I would love to have a listen to your swinging new speakers sometime when sorted or even before sorted to see if we can collectively come up with something.

You're welcome any time Paul. My work load is very manageable for the remainder of the year, so just let me know when suits you. Also, Bert should be sending my gainclones back to me next week having had a couple of upgrades and caps installed. I'll be able to use them with PA engaged and make a fairer comparison with the Sauermann monos.

Cheers, Mani.

[manisandher]

Hey Peter, thanks for your ideas.

... and let's stop naming LS cables interlinks...

Who's been doing this? Maybe you think that when I say 'anti-cables' I mean LS cables or interlinks. I actually mean both. I have anti-cable LS cables and anti-cable ICs (both SE with RCA connectors and balanced with XLR connectors). All my anti-cables are ready-made commercial products.

it may be an idea to investigate the BD30 in there and its internal wiring. Still I'd say that this won't be doing much to the mid-high, but when you can't find anything anyway ...

The noise isn't affected by the BD30s being on or off. But I'm doing all of the investigation with the BD30s off.

One thing we can eliminate straight away is the NOS1-> Sauermann connection. The noise remains the same when the XLR IC is disconnected from the amps.

I think I myself would start by getting the mains supply stuff out of the equation.

Thanks Peter. I'll try what you suggest and switch everything off at the AC mains consumer box.

It still can be that the BD30 of the time incurs for it. Bu I would doubt that.

Like I said, it doesn't matter whether they're on or off.

Thanks again for the ideas.

Cheers, Mani.

[Scroobius]

Mani - if it is any help I could bring my amp along - I know that the grounding arrangement with my amp together with NOS1 and a PC provides a dead quiet background in my system and also Nicks. We would try it at yours together with the Swings and perhaps another pair of speakers. It might help identify where the problem is. I know you have other amps etc around that you have probably already used but it might help provide some pointers.
P

[manisandher]

Hi Paul, thanks for offering to do this - yep, I think it could be very helpful. Meanwhile, I've got a couple of other amps here that I'll try first, and I'd also like to try a few different LS cables and AC mains configurations.

Ultimately the noise is only just audible from the listening position, but if Peter and Bert have managed to totally eliminate it a few cm away from the speakers, then I should aim to achieve exactly the same. A 115dB/W system at full gain with virtually no noise - that's quite a tall order, but at least we know it is actually possible.

I'm having a bit of work done in my basement (a small 'studio' for my vinyl digitisation project) which should be completed by the end of next week. How does the week commencing the 12th of Nov look for you? Nick, are you interested in joining us if we can find a suitable date? It might be a good opportunity to compare the Sauermann amps with Bert's BD30 super-gainclones and Paul's amp (which I think you have as well, right?). Hell, we could throw in the Berning Siegfried 300B and Sanders Magtech for good measure. Let me know.

Mani.

[PeterSt]

1. I dont think (but not 100% sure) that you can be capturing something from your LS cables that exhibits as noise; this would first need amplification of it (or ride on some amplitude being there first).

2. Disconnect your turntable and related stuff (preamp) from the mains.

[Scroobius]

Mani - when I had noise problems they were just audible from the listening position which is why I had not put any serious effort into resolving them (just too busy listening to music!!). Peter convinced me that noise is very bad thing so started my search to reduce it. When I did reduce it to very low levels I was shocked at the improvement in SQ. That was a big lesson for me - noise is indeed very very bad (from my experience anyway). And to think that every system I have previously had over the years has had discernible noise despite my best efforts to reduce it. Anyway best of luck.

By the way I guess that you are now officially a "swinger" ha ha.

Paul

[manisandher]

A swinger? Works for me... but Satty's just not into it - as far as she's concerned it's me or no-one ;-)

OK, I've spent the last couple of hours playing around with a few things. I twisted my anti-cable LS cables by hand (not pretty but hopefully good enough). I also brought up my PurePower unit from the basement. This was NOT connected to the AC mains at all and was being used purely as a battery pack outputting 230V.

I tried 3 different amps - the Sauermann, the Sanders Magtech and the Berning 300B. There was nothing connected at their inputs. So, just the power cable from the PurePower 230V battery pack (Live and Neutral only - no earth) and the LS cable to the speakers. The speakers' internal bass amps were not connected and were off.

All 3 amps exhibited a similar amount of noise. But the noise had a slightly different 'quality' depending on the amp being used.

So, it's either the LS cables 'at fault'... or I need a quieter amp! My super-gainclones should be back soon and I'll be interested in hearing how much noise there is with them...

Mani.

[Scroobius]

Mani - If I have nothing connected to the input of my amps I get noise and a fair amount of it. That is because the ground in my amp is not connected to anything so I have to connect it to NOS1 via i/c's. Oh and NOS1 ground is not connected to anything either so it has to be connected to the PC via the USB cable (which allegedly is connected to earth). So to get very low noise in my system the amp  NOS and PC all have to be connected together. By the way the fact the USB is connected to earth does not affect noise in my system. I know that because I used Nick's fibre USB link (thereby galvanically isolating NOS1 from the PC) and it made no difference to noise at all (that I could hear). So earth or no earth the noise levels in my system are very very low (if I remember rightly you stuck your "shell like" into my bass cone to 'av a listen).

Not sure if that helps but that is what happened for me.

By the way my i/c's to NOS are home made thin gauge silver wire basically simple twist with no shielding. And as I think you know my speaker cables are twisted lacquer coated copper wire. But with all the experiments with those I have not had a noise problem. But that is here in my system and we are all different.

Paul

[PeterSt]

So to get very low noise in my system the amp  NOS and PC all have to be connected together.

Completely correct !