"Jack" wrote in message
...
On Jan 4, 10:23 am, Tim wrote:


It should be easy enough to check for the lights as the source by
simply turning them off for a moment.

I've seen some really bad wiring "upgrades" done to older buildings.
Grounded outlets installed with no ground connection, ground conductor
and/or metal conduit carrying the neutral current (!), the classic hot/
neutral reversal, etc. A good piece of equipment to carry around is
one of these:

http://www.amazon.com/ELECTRICAL-REC.../dp/B002Q3R7HI

Of course you can do the same thing with an VOM, but these things are
a great go/no-go quick indicator.




Hehe, I'm glad I read down a bit before I offered the exact same advice.

When I bought my (now) 50 year old house, the listing agent mentioned that
the electrical was upgraded. A cursory inspection showed GFI outlets in the
"wet" areas, and 3 prong recepticals elsewhere. When under contract, I was
able to dig further... being a General Contractor, I did my own home
inspection. It turned out that the GFI outlets were grounded properly, but
none of the 3 prong outlets were grounded. All they did was replace the
outlets.

That saved me a few shekels on the purchase price.

--Mike

On Jan 4, 10:00*am, Tim wrote:
Its a long shot, but I was hoping that Gene or others with good
electrical experience might help.

Well, some friends of mine have a pretty good local band, and they
play at various venues around a tri-county area. OK, so I went up
town
to hear them Sat. and one member and I got to talking on their break
and he asked me so i thought I'd try to get some ideas here.

One place they play is an older brick building with everything that
can plague an older brick building.

I'm sure the wiring is sub-standard and I dont' know if it has
fluorescent lights causing fits or not. But all the amps and PA have
a
"hummmmmm" that they can't get rid of. The guitarists amp hums the
worst. Not totally obnoxious, but really annoying.

It seems that today's equipment(for the most part) doesn't have any
provisions for a "reverse" switch on the amps, and with three-prong
plugs it's kind of hard to do the old "turn-the-plug-around" trick.

Even with a reverse switch, I've seen instances where when flipped the
hum only got louder.

The manager says all the bar/ kitchen equipment is in good order, ,
but that's left to be seen.

So my question is, does anyone here know of any type of device/ power
bar etc, that can help compensate for this type of a problem?
All these players have good late model quality equipment and this is
the only venue they have this problem.

it's a good gig for them but event the patrons come and ask them
"what's the hum?" They don't know, I don't know.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Do they have Dimmers for the Club lighting? That will give you a hum,
if it's on the same circuit as the Amp. how long since the Amps been
serviced? Maybe bad ground wires inside. Could be a cold solder joint
in the Amp.