Direction of aftermarket fuses (only for believers!)


It is with reluctance that I start another thread on this topic with the ONLY GOAL for believers to share their experience about aftermarket fuses.
To others: you can call us snobs, emperors w/o clothes,... etc but I hope you refrain posting just your opinion here. If you did not hear any difference, great, maybe there isn’t.

The main driver for this new post is that I am starting a project to mod my NAD M25 7 ch amp for my home theater. It has 19 fuses (2 per channel, 4 on the power supply board, 1 main AC) and I will try a mix of AMR Gold, SR Black and Audio Magic Platinum (anyway that is the plan, I may try out some other brands/models). As it is reasonably difficult to change them, esp the ones on each channel module that requires complete disassembly, I would like to know what the direction is for these models mentioned and of course, others who HAVE HEARD there is a difference please share your experience on any fuse model you have tried.

Fuses are IME directional:
Isoclean is one of the first to indicate the direction (2008/2009) on their fuses. Users of HiFi Tuning (when the awareness rose quite a bit amongst audiophiles) have mostly heard the difference.

As an IEEE engineer, I was highly skeptical of cabling decades ago (I like the speaker design of John Dunlavy but he said on many occasions that cables nor footers matter at all, WRONG!). Luckily, my curiosity proved me wrong as well. I see the same skepticism that I and many others had about the need for aftermarket cables many, many years ago now on fuses and esp on the direction on fuses.

Another example is the direction of capacitors (I do not mean electrolytic types). Even some manufacturers now and certainly many in the past did not believe it can make a difference sonically. Maybe some do but it takes time in the assembly to sort and put them in the right direction/order (esp as some of the cap manufacturers still do not indicate "polarity") so that maybe is one argument why this is not universally implemented.








jazzonthehudson

geoff kait said:

I’m referring to an independent third party tester. That would be an honest and careful manner, no?

Like UL?
I read your last post. I read your last two posts. Did I err? Did I misinterpret something?
As far as I can tell, you misinterpret on purpose. That makes it hard to have a conversation. Example:
Or maybe you’re insinuating that any person who doesn’t get the results you’re looking for isn’t honest and careful, it’s hard to tell.
Al does not insinuate. You are one of the very few I have ever seen to attack Al, who IMO and that of many others is an important asset to this site. You might consider ratcheting down the rhetoric.
jea48
2,071 posts
05-25-2016 11:32am
geoff kait said:

"I’m referring to an independent third party tester. That would be an honest and careful manner, no?"

to which jea48 asked,

"Like UL?"

Yes, UL is a third party tester. You got that part right.  Does UL test for directionality is the part you didn't get right. 

And what recognized industry third party would that be?

Better yet. I am not disputing whether a fuse is directional or not. I believe many that have actually taken the time and tested it for themselves. BUT, with that said can you furnish anything that proves a fuse is directional? Not from a manufacture of audio grade fuses, but rather from an industry independent third party testing laboratory.

jea48
2,072 posts
05-25-2016 1:07pm
"And what recognized industry third party would that be?

Better yet. I am not disputing whether a fuse is directional or not. I believe many that have actually taken the time and tested it for themselves. BUT, with that said can you furnish anything that proves a fuse is directional? Not from a manufacture of audio grade fuses, but rather from an industry independent third party testing laboratory."

The HiFi Tuning fuse measurements that are provided in data sheets on their website were obtained by an independent third party tester. You probably didn’t realize that. You say you believe many people have taken the time to test directionality. One assumes you’re referring to listening tests. The biggest skeptics of aftermarket fuses don’t even do that. Ah, the academic ivory tower.

As for independent third party tester it could be UL. I personally doubt UL would take the job. It could be someone else, some other organization or even individual. I actually don’t think measuring voltage drops or whatever across a fuse requires a rocket scientist. Maybe you can contact NASA or NIST or MIT and see if they are interested. Lol