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Dedicated Mains / Memera / Roy K Riches

Hello Strummer,
Thank you for your kind comments. I'm also grateful for your generous hospitality, provided and cooked by your "better half", a full English breakfast feast with all the trimmings - superb! I intend to be in the Liverpool / Cheshire region in November for 3 days and will hopefully be able to visit your home and have another listen to your system now the 12 weeks burn-in period has elapsed.

NB. If there is anyone in the vicinity of "The Wirral" and South Liverpool who would be interested in me visiting them, then please contact me. If I have any time spare during these 3 days I will do my best to visit.
As always the Mains advice is totally free. I even have free gifts!
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Gentlemen,
My sincere thanks to all the other Mains converts who have bravely contributed here, I'm indebted to you all.
There were times past when I seemed to be a lone voice on Hi-Fi Forums, advocating Dedicated Mains for Hi-Fi; I am in your dept and further encouraged to continue this work (crusade?), so other's may also enjoy the splendour of their Hi-Fi system performing to 90% + of its true potential, and not the normal (disappointing) potential of 30% - 40% when powered by the SHARED household domestic ring-main. Yes, it really is that low - in my experience.
If you own a £10,000 Hi-Fi system then that equates to £6000 wasted potential! If people say they are content with that situation then that's fine by me, but in my experience these folk will forever be changing equipment, hoping for improvement that's seldom realised. Mains is the fuel that powers the Hi-Fi, ignore the implications of this fact and you'll have a system performing below par.

A dedicated single 16mm2 T&E spur for the Hi-Fi, correctly installed, can allow a system to achieve around 70% of its potential, but again that would still represent £3000 wasted potential with a £10,000 system. So, would a Dedicated Mains installation normally costing between £60 and £900 now be viewed as a wise investment?
The Multiple spurs approach where every item of Hi-Fi has its own spur, and every spur length MUST be identical, has been the most successful approach - however because it reveals SO MUCH detail the equipment/system set-up becomes of paramount importance. Ignore this at your peril because inadequateses in system set-up are ruthlessly revealed. Just like a finely tuned racing car, when its right, the performance is stunning!

During the last 7 years I've had the privilege and honour of visiting over 90 homes so I do have some experience on which to base the above rating % figures.
I visited a home where the top-Naim system, all on Fraim, into BW802D was being powered by the SHARED domestic ring-main and via a Music-Audio type Mains block, reputedly costing over £500. So, about £60,000 worth of kit and I gave it a performance rating of 5 /10. The owner had thought his system better than this, but for the princely sum of 14p I was able to demonstrate and improve the Mains supply to this system, and then up the performance rating to 6 /10, much to the pleasure and astonishment of the owner and his wife. They heard the improvement!
This incident reminded me of another home I visited in Ewhurst, Surrey, (wonderful people) where again BW 802Ds were being used and driven by a system of CDS2/XPS2, 52, pair 135's, all with Memera 10mm2 T&E Multiple Spurs (of exact equal length), and 32A RCBO's with 100Amp primary house fuse. I gave that system a rating of 8.5- 9 /10. The music, detail and soundstage in that large room was so real, magnificent! Cost of this system is about 1/3rd of the £60,000 above, but twice as musical, enjoyable and satisfying.
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I would make the comment that without having direct personal experience of whatever the subject matter, forming a basis of conclusion is just pure conjecture and speculation. And like Black Adder's broken pencil - "pointless"

In reply to Lee Bunker's speculation regarding MCBs - " I don't know which Roy recommends, however I seriously doubt any audible difference between them. " I found this speculation to be wrong. I've spent about £500 on 6 different brands of domestic Consumer units with their associated breakers and RCDs and found there was a massive sonic difference between the worst and the best. When I disassembled each of the 6 branded MCBs engineering and construction quality differences were obvious.
As mentioned above I have only tried 6 Brands of Consumer Units and their associated MCBs and RCDs, and these took 36 weeks to evaluate (I allotted 6 weeks burn-in for each). These are rated in this sonic order from worse to best - Clipsal, Contactum, Wylex, Crabtree, MK and Memera. When I talk about the Memera being the best sonically, I am not inferring that it has a sonic gain or merit, what I am saying is that this unit DEGRADED the sound the least. The other C.U's degraded the sound more-so.
Now there may be a sonically better Brand of Consumer Unit than Memera, but I'd had enough after 36 weeks of testing and £500 expense, and at least I know my "Best C.U." recommendation is not a complete "duffen", being the best of 6 tested. The whole approach to achieving the best Mains supply for the Hi-Fi is to keep the losses and degradation to the absolute minimum.
UPDATE July 2003 -MEMERA also betters the TENBY and PROTEUS brands of C.U. and MCBs for Hi-Fi, as related to me by a qualified installation Electrician, who did his own independent experiments and listening tests - so Memera is now rated the "Best" of 8 Consumer Units for Hi-Fi purposes!
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Anyone interested in the FREE 5Mb of Dedicated Mains for Hi-Fi documents please contact me. My e-mail account is included with my profile details.
Over 2000 people have requested these Mains documents, and I know over 800 have implemented some or all of the ideas. Currently I'm still receiving requests for these documents at 10 to 20 per month. I'll attempt to answer any additional questions you may have as quickly as possible, but it may take a few days. Please remember there is only me here to answer these questions, so please be patient.

I seldom write to Hi-Fi Forums now, so if you made it this far:-
Best Regards
Roy

PS Andyr. Congratulations, you have certainly impressed me. Mains fundamentals were not your strongest subject when we started corresponding last year. You learnt the basics very quickly and now exhibit a knowledgeable firm understanding of the matter. I'm pleased that our 27 e-mails of text and diagrams proved a definite worthwhile investment of both our times. Well done - excellent!
 
I would also like to pass on my thanks to Roy, initially for his information and then his continued patience with my rather basic queries as I slowly swallowed the concepts.

I now have a dedicated Memera CU run from long meter tails and an extra earthing rod, with 5x 10mm T&E spurs to large junction boxes. It has certainly done no harm to the sound, especially running a thirsty Pass-Labs power amp. All for the price of some company's 1m mains lead. Bargain IMHO.

The electrician was a little amused though, as I was dictating the spec.

Ian
 
I've had the quote back from the electrician. £210 + vat to "replace existing with CU 30MA main switch and MCBs", or extra £180 + vat to "replace existing with CU 100MA time delay main switch and RCB protecting sockets". This must mean £60 x 3 as at the time of visiting he had said "they" were £60 each.
Can anyone decipher what this means? thanks, Robert
 
Hello Ladies & Gentlemen.

For your information.
On the Eaton website it says that the 'old' Mem Memera CU's have been discontinued as of May this year (look here:- http://www.eaton.com/ecm/idcplg?IdcService=GET_FILE&dID=307028
I will not be evaluating these new units. After 6 years of testing/evaluation and about £800 of costs, I'm just not prepared to “break” my system again and test the new items.
Existing stocks of the old recommended Memera units may still be available at Electrical Wholesalers for the next few months, and currently there are many second-hand Memera C.U.s, MCBs & RCBOs advertised on E-Bay. The Memera units I use and recommend for Dedicated Hi-Fi Mains Supplies, were the best from 8 Brands tested and I'm not going to upset my Hi-Fi system again for many weeks/months while waiting for any new installed items to Burn-In. Other people can do these evaluations/tests at their own expense if they so wish.
Reading between the lines, my own interpretation of Eaton’s publication/announcement is that are going to reduce the build quality in favour of something cheaper, so they will compete on price with the other brands- and that is really bad news for anyone wanting to install Dedicated Mains for their Hi-Fi. I can purchase the cheaper brands of 32A MCBs (breakers) from Wylex, MK, Contactum, e.t.c, for under £3.75, but the Memera 32A MCBs cost £7.50. If powering an electric kettle, toaster or electric blanket any branded item of electrical protection will probably do the job, BUT when it comes to powering a decent Hi-Fi system there are definite audible differences. When I've opened-up the various MCBs to inspect the internals, the Memera was better engineered in all aspects, and sonically it is better - i.e. there is less degradation. However, the higher quality components and better construction has implications with higher unit cost.

I'll post this same info' in the D.I.Y section

Best regards
Roy
 
Shame, do you known if there is still a supply of Memera MCBs? I over-tightened a couple and need replacements.
 
Ditto, will I be able to get any MCBs in future, or will they end up like and hens' teeth and Linn Troikas? (Or, at least, would other brands at least work in the Memera, i.e., are MCBs made to a standard pattern?)
 
Johnny Blue said:
Ditto, will I be able to get any MCBs in future, or will they end up like and hens' teeth and Linn Troikas? (Or, at least, would other brands at least work in the Memera, i.e., are MCBs made to a standard pattern?)
Click to expand...
3kw in Cardif still stocks them and they appear on EBay regularly.

IMHO I think they will be future 'hen's teeth'.
 
Johnny Blue said:
(Or, at least, would other brands at least work in the Memera, i.e., are MCBs made to a standard pattern?)
Click to expand...

Yes, MCBs are made to a standard fitting - so, basically, any MCBs fit in any board - but what Roy's research showed was that the Memera MCBs gave better sound than the other 5 makes he tested out.

Regards,

Andy
 
andyr said:
Yes, MCBs are made to a standard fitting - so, basically, any MCBs fit in any board .......
Regards,

Andy
Click to expand...

Not completely true. If you read the FAQ-pdf from Eaton that Roy included in has last post above it says:

2. Will the existing range of Circuit Protection Devices fit into this new consumer unit?
The existing range of Circuit Protection Devices will not fit into the new consumer units, as the size profile is different.
Click to expand...

So there are more things changing

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Jabbr
 
jabbronsky said:
Not completely true. If you read the FAQ-pdf from Eaton that Roy included in has last post above it says:



So there are more things changing

-
Jabbr
Click to expand...

Well, things certainly might be changing, Jabbr, but the Memera items I orderd from Roy (3x32amp MCBs and an RCD) certainly fit my non-Memera, Oz Consumer Unit.

Regards,

Andy
 
Too many quotes within quotes here to make any sense, so this is in reply to Jabbr and Andy:

1) Just because Eatons say the "existing range of Circuit Protection Devices will not fit into the new consumer units, as the size profile is different", doesn't mean the reverse isn't true: that other brands of MCBs won't fit into a Memera board, as Andy said in Post #249.

2) It'd be good to get a definitive answer from someone who knows for sure, because (at least for me, in my putative set-up) I'll only need one Memera MCB (for the hi-fi spur) and the others can be any brand, as long as they fit into a Memera CU.
 
Hi Johnny Blue

You are right of course about the reverse might not be true.

What I wanted to point out is that with the new Eaton CU's there are probably coming new MCB's that fit the new CU, but might not fit the older Memera CU's any more.

I just wanted to add some nuance to the statement that all MCBs fit all CU's, because it appears that might no longer be true anymore. So you will have to check the size of the profile of both the CU and MCB you are looking at or go for the type numbers as specified by Roy K Riches because they are still out there. I found several suppliers using Google.

-
Jabbr
 
I've been meaning to post about my mains upgrade experience for months now, but never got around to it.

A bit of background first on what got me tuned into the profound effects of mains and which eventually led me invest time and a few drinking vouchers on a full mains upgrade. Apologies up front for the longest post in history, but I wanted to tell the full story of my experience. If you get bored easily, best to go listen to some lovely music instead 

I’ve been heavily into music and hi-fi for 25 years and I got my first seriously high-end system together about twelve years ago. A largely forgotten background in electrical engineering in the distant past led me to install four dedicated 2.5mm2 spurs from the Consumer Unit (not de rigueur back then). Nothing more than that – just four spare ways in the CU which I used for dedicated 2.5mm spurs to un-switched sockets behind the hi-fi kit.

Like most of us, I dabbled in power cords and mains conditioners over the years and, after a few wrong turns, got some big improvements in the music. But what really peeved me was that my system consistently sounded better in the wee small hours: those evenings when you think you'll just listen to a quick CD before going to bed and, before you know it, its 3am, the music sounds magical and you just cannot tear yourself away (until girlfriend or wife comes in with a big stick). The 3am sound always had more life, more space and flow and was just more exciting.

There’s no rocket science in the 3am effect – reduced load on the local power network allows sagging voltage to recover and there are far fewer ‘nasty’ loads like PCs and electric motors bouncing RF & distortion back into the mains signal. What surprised me was the scale of improvement in the 3am sound, even with all those nice power conditioners and cables … oh dear.

Roll the clock forward. I had an all-new new system (not Naim) and I came across Roy through a friend. I didn’t need too much convincing on the theory behind installing dedicated mains wiring right from the incoming fuse, but I needed a lot of convincing on how much of a difference it would make and whether it was worth the effort. Roy was very patient and took time to persuade me to try small things like replacing the main incomer fuse with a 100A unit and polishing the end caps (all usual safety warnings here of course). The impact of this was not subtle – smoother highs, with more space and detail and more dynamics. I’ve quite serious money for musical gains like this in the past.

So I decided to take the plunge. I’m not good at doing things by half and did some research first. I have big digital active speakers (Meridian) which can easily draw over 1,600VA on transients. I looked into lengths of the meter tails to my CU (I live on top floor of a big 3-storey period building) and the spurs (20m). I looked up manufacturer specs for voltage drop per metre on various cable sizes at 1A and discovered that, with the Meridians running at proper ‘listening-session’ levels, each one would be pulling north of 6.5A in the loud bits. The total voltage drops over 20m lengths of spur were frightening for 2.5mm (upto 10%) and still worrying for 10mm2 at 2.5%. Drops in supply voltage like that are bad news, so that’s how I came to go for 16mm2 spurs.

My upgrade probably ranks among the toughest to do, as the new tails had to come up through two floors in the building and the spurs had to go from the dedicated new Memera CU through a big roof space and down the front wall of my lounge. I was lucky enough to find a great local electrician who didn’t think I was a nutcase and run away. He did a great job and was happy to talk to Roy at times for advice. I got the local provider to replace the cables from the main incoming fuse to the meter with 25mm and my electrician put in 25mm2 tails up to the new Memera CU. We had a tough time putting in the 16mm twin & earth as it’s heavy and hard to bend, but the end result was very tidy. We paid a lot of attention to clean, low-impedance joints and followed Roy’s instructions to the letter, including big 100A junction boxes with Beasts hardwired into them.

So what did it all sound like? Roy had warned me several times to expect a messy sound at first, as the new wiring would take time to run in. When I finally got the system back up and running, I must say I panicked a bit at first. The sound was bigger and more dynamic, but it was hard-edged and there was no flow and musicality. This was exactly what Roy had told me to expect in the first week or so, but I still worried a bit.

Strangely, the sound changed quite quickly and erratically over the next couple of weeks. I could listen one evening and hear one thing and then hear a very different sound the next evening. It didn’t make sense, even though Roy had said that this would happen. Beyond two weeks though, it was clear something special was happening, even though the sound was still on the move. There was a lot more ‘thereness’ and the dynamics were already in a different league.

Roy and I had talked about the possibility that 16mm2 might take longer to run in than 10mm2 and it turned out to the case. It was around 16 weeks before I felt that the sound had stopped changing, although I’d say it was 80% of the way there after 8 weeks.

As for the sound after 16 weeks, there were staggering improvements on many fronts. The biggest is that the system sounds much more real now – voices hang in the air with palpable body and are almost touchable in texture and solidity. The Meridian 808.2 CD player I have is big on presence straight out of the box, but the new mains moved this into another league. The sound is also very ‘live’ from vastly improved dynamics – music has real life and energy now and hard-hit drums sound just that. The soundstage has opened out significantly, placing voices and instruments higher and wider, but with more solidity. More than the width, the depth has increased very significantly – you really get a great sense of how far forward or back things are in the mix.

There’s another big change that feels like an impossibility in normal hi-fi terms – there is much, much more detail now, but it’s real musical detail and it’s much smoother than before the upgrade. You can hear instruments and voices more clearly. The mix of detail and smoothness is infectious and I love it. Of all the changes, it’s the big lift in detail that’s the most surprising – not something you’d expect from mains.

What matters most for me is musicality, flow and emotion in the music and this too has improved enormously. I now hear infectious, foot-tapping rhythms in quiet intros that just weren’t there before.

Overall, I’d say the gain from the mains upgrade was as big as the change I got when I swapped out my whole system. Different changes, but every bit as big. The caveat is that, apart from doing all the great things I mentioned above, your system will behave as if it has a lot more power and drive, and you may need to take some time to re-position your speakers to get the balance right. If your system is shy on bass now, you may end up just right. In my case, I’ve had to turn down the bass (digital controls on the Meridian speakers) and move the speakers a bit further out from the wall. That said, the Meridians are big speakers that produce serious deep bass anyway, so don’t be put off by this factor. By the way, the stronger bass is faster, deeper and more controlled – you may just find you have a little too much of it until you move things around a bit.

OK, it’s time to sign off, but I want to say one more thing. I’d be very happy to hear from anyone who is interested in music and mains and I’ll respond to raised eyebrows and searching questions delivered in a friendly way. If there are souls out there who feel inclined to shoot me down aggressively on the basis of theory before experience and call me delusional, I’d really rather you posted on another forum (ideally hosted on another planet). I know enough ‘theory’ to know how much I don’t know. I’m also a very tough and objective judge of changes in my system – I listen at length to changes in the music and, if there is no improvement, or things get worse, I throw out the offending item without question. Can I explain 16+ weeks of burn in on 16mm2 twin & earth? Absolutely not. But I like what I hear.

Anyway, back to a happy note - I’d love to hear from interested people. I’m not a practicing scientist, but I love music and will share all I can of my experience.

OK sorry for the very long post. If you got bored and left before the end, I sympathise and I hope you enjoyed listing to some very nice music instead. If you read the whole thing, you deserve a beer … :)

Thanks for listening.
 
Wow ! That was a bolt out of the blue. As a matter of interest, a spur is something taken off an existing (ring) main, whereas you have a ginormous sngle radial circuit. That's what I've been told, and it sounds quite logical to me.

You're preaching to the converted, btw, but I have six x 10mm2 plus two x 6mm2 t & g to feed individual pieces of kit. All hard-wired of course.

You don't mention the earth spike; an important component if your domestic earthing safely allows this addition.

You're quite right; the increase in dynamics is probably the most significant factor, but improvements in many other aspects of musicality are significant by-products of this.
 
Did this four/five years ago when all the work was being done on the house. New unit and rather thick cables run through to the living room, three separate runs to unswitched sockets. Worked for me. The electricians raised an eyebrow but were more than happy to accomodate me despite the inflexible cabling runs!
 
Did the same twenty five years ago (and a bit different with a US installation.) The small cost in parts and labour was worth it with a large reduction in distortion and improvement in realism. Assuming every component benefits, it's a no-brainer.
 
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