howdy outlaws
i have a problem, maybe somebody out there has a fix.
i recently moved the system downstairs and now whenever i touch the 1050 i get a little shock(which i can deal with,having grown up in electronics with a father for an electrician), but what i can't deal with is the sound shutting off momentarily. i have a so-so surge protector(no line conditioner yet). what i've noticed it on is listening to cd's through the denon cd changer to the 1050 , 1050 to monitor audio asw-210 through lfe,main pre out split to b & k vmw-654 to passive bi-amp my b & w 601's. i can touch the amp and get shocked and not shut down, just when i touch the 1050.this is audio only system for the time being(was running a ht for awhile but i'm a music nut). any ideas?

forgot, i did just run a broom across the carpet real quick, could i have charged it somehow?

Add one of these to your forced air furnace, assuming you have a forced air furnace of course. Increasing the relative humidity will greatly reduce the static potential in your home and wil make you feel warmer at a lower temperature.

FWIW, Yes I am in the HVAC business and I sell quite a few of these every year.

Frank it's odd you link to the Aprilaire. I just installed a Model 400 in my mothers house a few weeks ago, for all the resons you mention.

frank z,
nice ht, by the way!
i guess i zapped all the static out of my body for now....i'll try the vacuum next time!
but.......i'm dry by winter(never realized how dry till this happenned) and very damp in spring to fall(basement) dehumid does good when ac is off. but once i reach late sept. i shut it down till spring.does this unit work at both extremes?

Thank you sir!!

No, a Whole house humidifier should be installed/connected so that it only functions when the furnace is actually heating the home. Once the house is at the proper humidity level the humidifier stays off. This controlled by a Humidistat that is mounted in the return air duct neat the furnace. I recommend a setpoint of 30-35% for my customers.

Running a humidifier in the summer doesn't do you or your a/C any good. Adding humidity to the home increases the amount of humidity the A/C then has to remove from the air, which eats away alot of your systems cooling capacity.

Until you find a better solution, I suggest a temporary measure. Once you've walked up to your equipment, discharge any static electricity to something other than your equipment, even if that means plugging something with a three conductor power cord into an outlet or power strip and touching that first.

there used to be a humidity control in the hall along time ago(i grew up here)(i'm not in daytona anymore!!!)
i'll click my heels 3 times!
i'm gonna have to play this out(i just zapped myself again) i'll try to ground myself out before like bb4tb said.
jeeez my battery clock that has been dead for months just started.
we'll see what happens .
thanks outlaws!

Why not use the remote?

uhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!
haven't come off the money for the remote.
bought it all used.
and if i told you what i paid......
way low!!!!!!!

i know $65+

i gotta deal!
should just buy a remote, but.....

by the way, that was a vmr-654 6 channel amp
don't wanna confuse anybody.
b & k basically has told me this amp does/does not exist
my dealer contacted b & k and was told the same!
nobody knows nothin'
how 'bout you guys?

Interesting thread. This does sound like a low humidity condition primarily. We were up near Peoria over the weekend (Champaign-Urbana, specifically, just a ways down the road), and the weather was definitely conducive to low relative humidity inside. As Frank Z recommends, a humidifier (particularly a unit-mounted model) controlled by a humidistat in the return duct can definitely help with this during the winter months, particularly in regions with more substantial winters - I doubt many residences in the southeast have them, but areas like Colorado and Illinois are a different story. We have actually begun using humidifiers in a few commercial buildings (mounted in the air handlers) for the sake of occupant comfort with a setpoint of 35% RH. Also as Frank Z says, you don't need or want to be running the humidifier in the cooling season - at that point, your AC unit is already trying to eliminate moisture from the airstream and adding moisture not at all a good idea.

i have been researching through other stereo guys around and gotten some suggestions:

1. connect a ground lead between the 1050 and amp to prevent a spike through the rca's...
2. a coffee can full of water on top of the furnace...
3. run a vaporizer for a short time in another room,on another circuit...i like this idea best for a cheap fix....

'tis gonna be the season shortly with family comin' over and i am gonna wanna show off my newest pride and joy, it would be pretty embarassing to say "check this out" and have them kevlar cones flying out of the cabinets.(it probably would be cool,i have yet to launch a cone)(but not my b & w's)

maybe i can drop hints and somebody will buy me a remote for christmas....

what do you guys think about these ideas?

Ummm ... have you tried approaching your gear with your shoes off? Dunno about the socks

been zapped in socks and shoes both

how about a stick to turn it on? a dowel cant cost much, since you are too cheap for a re-mo-te.

ohhhh, that's nice!
i just got done scrubbing my keyboard down so it is still wet, i had to go get my other board to reply.it's not the fact that "i'm too cheap" but the fact that i'm playing with 2 butt kickin'(to me) home systems, putting the finishing touches on the stereo in my s-10(that will beat you half to death)finishing prepping the body so i can lay down a set of ghost flames,lowering it a couple inches,insulating the basement,putting new ext. doors upstairs,plus i have a very bad tool habit, a bad cd habit,definitely smoke too much,have holidays comin up, did i mention that i recently got laid off because the autobody industry here sucks and there is not a lot of work around here.but i am not lazy enough that i can't walk across the room to adjust something.but i do get annoyed sometimes by not having a remote for the 1050 because i have remotes for everything else that is remote controlled, even the head unit in my truck and that's only a foot away.......

ah the conveniences of modern ingenuity.

As for the second idea (coffe can full of water on the furnace), my in-law's do something similar with a wood-burning stove in their living room - they leave a tea kettle of water on top of the stove in the winter, and the heat helps evaporate the water slowly and act as a humidifier. Depending on the way your house is conditioned, though, it may not work in all cases: most forced air furnaces have the heater near the bottom of the unit, so there isn't much heat passed through the top of the unit to warm up the coffee can. It would work for a boiler in a steam or hot water radiator system.

i'm gonna try the can o' water, there is a small vent on top of the furnace and it feels pretty warm i'll just make sure not to block it.it was kinda damp yesterday and supposed to be for a couple of days, so i'll see if this does help, when it starts dryin' out down here again.i'll let you know if this helps.
thanks to all for the feedback.

joe

still has been real damp around here lately so don't know if the can'o'water or the ground between the 1050 amd the amp is helping but i did notice something that i hadn't before,that 2 prong power cord, that seems to be a week link in the whole chain,all the other "more expensive" components i have,have beefy computer type cords on them.i've never taken full advantage of the 1050's amp section, but it seems like a pretty powerful unit for that little cord.have all 1050's built been like this or do i have maybe a first run?

I put in a new gas forced air furnace a couple of years ago and asked the HVAC guy about getting one with a humidifier built into it. He said that it wasn't needed and would be a waste of money. Turns out that his advice was a good as his workmanship. I should have gotten another guy right away, but didn't. Luckily I don't have too much of a problem with low humidity, but it isn't due to his advice. What I do have is an 55 gallon aquarium. This evaporates about 3 gallons of water per week into the air, and while I could use more, this takes the edge off of the snap-crackle-pops. It also, unfortunately, puts a little more noise into the air, but, hey, with a 950/770 combo that's not a big problem.

Jeff