"transformer" for 220v to 110 outlet.

[Goedjn]

If you're going to be opening up boxes, why not just move one of the two hots to the nuetral-bus in the service panel, tag it at both ends, and replace the receptical and breaker?

[Philip Lewis]

If I recall correctly, there is a rule in the NEC that says a 120V outlet can be installed on the 240V feed for use when the dryer has both 120V and 240V plugs.... so you might be able to get an electrician in there to install the "120V" plug without "running a new circuit". I'm probably missing some nuance of the rule though.

A 240 line is usually the neutral and the two hot phases of the 120V service in the residential home. (sometimes they have ground as well)

If *I* needed a temporary 120V feed, I'd get a 240V (dryer) cord, run it into a outlet box, cap one of the hot feeds, and wire up the second hot/neutral to an outlet. I'd really want to put some sort of ground on the device if possible, or use a gfci outlet if ground wasn't available. Then I would plug in only when using the feed. This would probably break all sorts of rules in the NEC though... so I wouldn't recommend it for someone else.

I can't tell you what to do...I'm not a licensed electrician, and I don't know what's going on at your house/box, nor do I know your skill level.

Good luck in any case.

[Harry Everhart]

I have an idea - hook a wire from the treadmill to the dryer. Then run real hard - and you can power the dryer by running. I saw this on ESPN - Lance Armstrong had a bike hooked up to the ESPN transmitter. When he stopped pedaling the TV program went black :-)

Harry

[JerryMouse]

Jeeze! Try it and see if the circuit flips.

If it doesn't, you're golden.

If the circuit flips, THEN worry about how to overcome the problem.

[Greg O]

The transformer large enough to run the motor on your tread mill would be pretty large, and somewhat expensive. If the 240 volt outlet is unused, get an electrician over to convert it over to 120 volt. It should not be a big deal. Greg

[Philip Lewis]

And that would be the nuance of the rule that i mentioned i might have missed. I was thinking of the stove outlets. Thank you for clearing up the misunderstanding. (btw i also said the electrician might be able to install a plug when i meant to say outlet.)

If i were going to do it, I would likely have seen the condition... which is why i said for him to call an electrician to see about it. I also would use a circuit tester... though i don't think it can tell a ground from a neutral, they should be electrical neutral to each other and should be connected in the circuit panel... or is that another nuance i've missed? (My guess is that assuming i thought the other non hot wire was a neutral, and if i wired the receptacle using that assumption that it would show an open ground which is what i would be expecting)

I'm not... (aside from telling him that i thought there was an "easy" option that he should talk to an electrician about)... i thought I made that clear... Perhaps not.

and probably not even then. :)

A neutral conducts electricity in normal operation, A ground conducts only in some fault state. At least that is my understanding of the situation... but hey, you've shown my memory to be faulty... so i'm not guaranteeing anything.

[toller]

I saw a 240v generator on Ebay that came with a 240-120 converter; so they do exist and can't be all that expensive.

Since no one has referred you to a source WHY NOT DO A GOOGLE SEARCH?

An interesting problem though... A 120v outlet in your garage has to be GFCI. Would a converter in your garage have to be GFCI? Donno.

[Doug Miller]

He needs a GFCI on it, too. (It's in a garage.)

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

Nobody ever left footprints in the sands of time by sitting on his butt. And who wants to leave buttprints in the sands of time?

[Doug Miller]

When someone asks "how do you do this?" and you tell him "this is how I would do it" that *is* giving advice.

That's correct as far as it goes, but it's not the whole story. In particular you don't seem aware that while 240V circuits nearly always have

*grounds*, they frequently do *not* have neutrals -- and that's what makes your advice to the OP not only wrong, but also dangerous. Hence my statement that you should not be giving out electrical advice.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

Nobody ever left footprints in the sands of time by sitting on his butt. And who wants to leave buttprints in the sands of time?

[Philip Lewis]

If someone asked how to change the behavior of a program, and i say that "most programs can be changed in the source code" and that "they should find a programmer" to do it.

Then I say that *I* would take the source code, modify it, and recompile because i have had some programming experience. That does not mean i think *they* should re-code it, nor does it make them a programmer.

I did not cover the case of "If i went to the source and saw that it was written in the language "Forth" (which i don't know) I wouldn't do it.

My "advice" was that i *think* it can be done easily, and they should call someone who is familiar with it.

I did not ever say to connect a hot and ground to supply power. I specifically said I would connect a neutral and hot together, and that i would want to have a ground at the location as well. That choice of wording specifically would seem to indicate that there was a difference between the two, and that just perhaps, I knew the difference between the two. Which is why I made it very clear that I don't recommend they do what I said i would do.

In my original post, i see that i did screw up and say that there is usually a neutral and sometimes a ground... My thought patterent went: "I recall there are places when you can legally install a 120V circuit which requires a neutral, so there must be a neutral in there." I focused on the exception and generalized it. I screwed up. (and i admited so in the first reply). Sorry.

Out of curiosity, If there is an unmarked white insulated wire in an outlet, other than tracing it back to the circuit panel, is there a way differentiate between neutral and ground? (Let's assume that it wasn't hooked to a box ground lug and that we have no idea if it's wired to code.)

In any case, we're mostly talking semantics and interpretation now... which isn't helping this guy get his treadmill plugged in.

[Doug Miller]

[snip irrelevant word games]

No, that's *not* what you wrote. This is:

"If *I* needed a temporary 120V feed, I'd get a 240V (dryer) cord, run it into a outlet box, cap one of the hot feeds, and wire up the second hot/neutral to an outlet. I'd really want to put some sort of ground on the device if possible, or use a gfci outlet if ground wasn't available. Then I would plug in only when using the feed. This would probably break all sorts of rules in the NEC though... so I wouldn't recommend it for someone else."

Like I said... if someone asks how to do something, and you say "this is how I'd do it" that *is* giving advice.

Refer to your advice above: "cap one of the hot feeds, and wire up the second hot/neutral to an outlet." Problem is, there is NO NEUTRAL in a typical 240V circuit. The OP obviously doesn't understand 240V circuits any better than you do, and by following your advice he may well use the bare wire, thinking it's the "neutral" that you're talking about.

You also wrote: "A 240 line is usually the neutral and the two hot phases of the 120V service in the residential home. (sometimes they have ground as well)"

and this seems to indicate that you don't understand the difference between ground and neutral, at least with respect to 240V circuits.

That's exactly what I've been telling you. Glad you finally noticed.

[...]

Hook an ammeter to it, and apply a load to the circuit. If the ammeter shows current flowing, it's either hot or neutral. If the ammeter shows no current, either it's ground, or it's not connected to that circuit.

No, we're *not* talking semantics and interpretation. We're talking the difference between safe and unsafe practice.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

Nobody ever left footprints in the sands of time by sitting on his butt. And who wants to leave buttprints in the sands of time?

[meirman]

In alt.home.repair on Mon, 28 Feb 2005 12:42:28 -0700 Andy Hill posted:

Better yet, Harry, with a few pullies and drive belts, and the removal of the access panel at the rear of washer, you could connect the treadmill to the washer.

For normal loads, Jack would run at 6 to 8 miles an hour, and for lingerie and other delicates he would walk at about 2 miles and hour.

With a mirror on the inside of the washer lid, Jack could get visual feedback on how the laundry was doing.

He wouldn't need any electricity to run either the dryer or the treadmill.

W

Meirman

-- If emailing, please let me know whether or not you are posting the same letter. Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

[meirman]

Travis posted

In alt.home.repair on 28 Feb 2005 09:04:39 -0800 [e-mail] posted:

That's basically what Travis is recommending. If you have 4 slots, and not 3, in the dryer outlet.

I bet you could do this, or get someone to do it for you. There are only four wires and they are already connected at the plug end.

You can get what they called a pigtail, a replacement cord with the standard dryer plug on the end, for a dryer, at a hardware store.

Also get a surface mount 110 volt receptacle (also called an outlet). Surface mount means that it screws to the outside of the wall, doesn't have to be mounted inside the wall to look right. These boxes have a lot more space in them than most "receptacle-ends" of extension cordds, and pros don't seem to like cords that aren't firmly fixed to a wall. This *is* the only place in the house you'll be able to use this cord, so there is little reason not to screw it to the wall, right?

You connect the black or the red wire -- it doesn't matter which -- of the cord to the gold contact of the receptacle. You cut off the other wire, the red or the black, or you cover the end with a wire nut or tape*** so that the wire inside doesn't touch anything. You connect the white wire to the silver screw of the receptacle, and you connect the bare wire to a green screw on the receptacle, or whatever is labelled the ground screw.

All of this can be assembled *before* you plug it in to the dryer outlet.

The only way you can come up with more than 110 volts would be if you used both the red and the black wires of the cord, and you won't do that, will you?:)

***Others here can tell you what is best.

Meirman

-- If emailing, please let me know whether or not you are posting the same letter. Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.