[Hammarlund] Re: Hammarlund power ground (rkerr)

[Bob Young]

When I was a kid playing in bands all the amps had two prong plugs and also usually had a "polarity" switch which eliminated having to unplug the amp and reverse it. The way we would tell when it was correct without getting shocked was to unplug the instrument and leave the cord plugged into the amp and flip the polarity switch back and forth, whichever way produced the least hum was correct. With these old amps anything metal on your guitar including the metal strings was hot if the polarity switch was thrwon the wrong way. We were accustomed to this but of course once in a while you would hear of some musican getting electrocuted while playing, for example The Little River Band's bass player died onstage sometime during the 70's because of this. I myself came close, walked up to a mic on a hot sweaty day with my bass in my hands, put my lips up to it and was almost knocked unconscious and didn't go near the mic for the rest of the afternoon, I found out later the polarity switch was bad. I used an amp like this until 1995.
Bob Young
KB1OKL


> Mike Taylor wrote:
>> Hammarlund manuals say that if there is objectional audio hum, reverse the two wire plug at the outlet. I've never noticed any difference one way or the other. Does this have anything akin to the use of a two wire plug that's polarized? Also, what is the difference between using a three wire plug with the green wire connected to chassis, or connecting the "G" terminal on the antenna input strip to a good earth ground (copper rod driven into the earth or water pipe connection)? Either way, your connected to earth, so what's the difference?