Re: Plug a 240V-110V US Dryer in Europe

From: Rich Grise (rich_at_example.net)
Date: 10/30/04 

Date: Sat, 30 Oct 2004 21:50:29 GMT

On Sat, 30 Oct 2004 13:58:59 -0700, Frederic C wrote:

> Hello,
> I have bought a Whirlpool Dryer in the US, and I have now moved to Spain.
> I have brought my dryer with me, thinkiing that as the power supply is
> 220V DC with ground here, it would not be a problrm to plug it.
> I realized that I need to bring also 110V to the command circuit of the
> dryer, and for this I have a transformer 220V to 110V. Now my question is:
> How do I connect the 4 wires coming off my dryer (ground-green,
> neutral-white, black and red) to my power supplies (2-wires 110V, and
> 2-wires + ground 220V) ? Thanks for your help.
 
You might already be out of luck. It's a little late now to un-ship a
dryer to Spain.

The problem you're going to face is that in the US, the white neutral
is connected to earth ground at the entrance panel, so there should
ideally be no difference of potential at all between the white neutral
and green safety ground. I don't know if that can be reproduced in Spain,
because I don't know how their grounding is arranged, but I'd be surprised
to find out that they ground the center-tap of 220V mains.

So, you could theoretically run it, but probably not safely.

If one side of the 220V mains is grounded, you're *** out of luck.
You have a very expensive piece of potentially lethal surplus.

But don't take my word for it - ask a Spanish electrotechnico - you
might get lucky. And failing that, there's a remote possibility that
the dryer could be modified, but probably not cheaply.

Good Luck!
Rich