ground bus question

[husky]

I see a lot of the builds here with a ground bus formed by soldering a bus wire across the back (case) of all the pots on the front of the amp. The end of the bius closest to the input jack is grounded near the input jack shield.

But aren't the pots shorted to the chassis where the pot sticks through the holes on the front of the chassis? In which case, where do the ground currents actually flow: through the chassis, or through the ground bus wire, or some parallel combination of both?

That is the problem. You really cant trust currents thru the chassis and where they travel. Personally I like to keep the ground buss elevated off the chassis and off the pots. You can use a 2 terminal strip in 3 or 4 places and elevate it Tie it to chassis at one place and if it isn't the input jack put a 10N and 51 ohm in series from the jack ground to chassis for RF. More than one way to do this of course but this way takes no chances.

[diagrammatiks]

yup.

buss soldered on pots doesn't guarantee that you'll have a ground loop but it does increase the possibility depending on how else you ground the amp.

the thing is that if you are following a good star ground scheme, there's no reason to solder to the back of the pots in the first place.