PAF 2023

On Sunday morning, I headed to the Marketplace to visit Kingrex Electric. King Rex himself, Rex Hungerford, was standing amid tables covered with a number of their modified and custom-built electrical panels and other components. He was explaining and fielding questions about what Kingrex does, which is designing specialized AC circuits and equipment to provide an audio system with absolutely the cleanest and quietest power possible. Or in website-speak, they have a singular focus, "Enriching the audio experience with clean electricity."

Hungerford explained that at the 30,000-foot level, this means they act as consultants to thoroughly analyze residential and commercial AC systems and offer several different solutions for eliminating problems in that specific situation. The process begins with a phone call, then Hungerford traveling to a site to discuss the situation and perform a detailed analysis. He'll recommend a suite of things, both general and specific to that application that will make a big difference and that can be done with the existing system in place. Heads up—be prepared for detailed instructions to perform a heroic cleaning and deoxidization of everything, from the innermost bits of the house's main panel to headshell pins and tube sockets. In some cases, it's other things like simply adjusting the position of feeder wires, or eliminating splices that will bring about inordinately large improvements.

After the analysis, the second step is designing an optimum system, and several less involved options, and discussing the pluses and minuses of each approach. Once the decisions have been made, Kingrex will provide the final design, including detailed drawings and specs, to your electrician, work with them to implement the design, and provide whatever modified or custom components that are required.

At each step of the way, there are options, and choices to be made. For example, should an existing main panel be thoroughly cleaned and treated, or would replacing it with a custom one provided by Kingrex Electric simply make too large an improvement to forego? Replace the feeder wires with larger ones and optimize the runs? Maybe a dedicated subpanel at the listening room, with a breaker and 10-gauge wire for each outlet? Or maybe go all out and install a gigantic, built-to-spec Torus transformer and a bespoke sub-panel with things like ¼" thick, silver plated, copper buses?

In a world where conditioning often involves nonsensical widgets and impressive, technical-sounding descriptions that have no meaning, it was refreshing to hear about Kingrex Electric's approach of analyzing and planning, and then going back to the beginning and doing things optimally from there.