220 volt worklight?

I recently bought a Jet drill press. Its seems to work well and I'm happy with it. I added power and wiring to my emerging shop and I have an abundance of 220v. outlets. I convert every stationary power tool to

220volt. Last night I did the drill press. Before powering up, I remembered about the builtin worklight, which uses a perfectly ordinary 60 watt light bulb. Looking through Jet's manual and instructions, there is no mention anywhere about changes in the worklight when converting to 220 volt. However, the internal schematic clearly shows the worklight is connected across the incoming power lines. So if these become 220 volt, then the light will be 220 volt, too.

Before taking a chance, I called Jet technical support and asked about it. The tech guy was less than stunning - atypical of my support experience for my table saw. After my explanation of what the worklight was, he firmly stated that the bulb would not have to be changed. I tried to argue and explain the wiring. What I really wanted was Jet's direction on what kind of replacement bulb I should use and where to get it. He told me the bulb was only on one leg of the 220 and it would not be a problem.

Ok. So I powered up the drill and tested the motor. It ran just fine with no sign of distress running on 220 volt. I got that part right. Then I screwed in a light bulb. It went POW and tripped the circuit breaker, slightly melting the center contact on the bulb. I restored power and checked the voltage across the light bulb socket -- 240.1 volts.

After searching for three hours and consulting with my dealer, he helped me find bulbs at Grainger and let me purchase under his dealership name. Great. I picked up two 60 watt 230 volt bulbs which cost an arm and a leg, by the way. I was really unhappy when I got home and discovered these bulbs were "fatter" than their 110 volt counterpart. They would not fit in the Jet drll press. Finally, I got out the wiring diagram and studied it. I changed one connection to put 110 volt on the light, while leaving 220 volt on the motor. After testing everything with a meter, I powered up. The motor still ran just fine and a 110 volt standard bulb worked fine.

I had logged another call with jet support, leaving a message on their answering machine. Another tech rep called me and said the first rep was completely wrong when he told me I would not need to replace the bulb and he apologized. He told me I needed an appliance bulb like those used in electric ranges. Well, some more bad advice. I could not find a 220 volt appliance bulb anywhere.

So I guess I'll go with my unauthorized rewiring job and get along with standard bulbs. They are so much cheaper, anyway.

Bob

Reply to
Bob Davis
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Do you have a neutral on your 240v to the saw? I expect not if you used standard outlets and plugs. Presumably you ran the 120v through the bulb to ground.

I don't have a real problem with that, but you should be aware that:

1) It is a code violation. 2) If under some bizarre situation you lose your ground connection, you will have 300ma desparate to get to ground any way possible. One route it through the saw, to you, to ground. I have never lost a ground, and I can't imagine why you would, but you should be aware of the problem.

You could avoid this by simply putting another 120v bulb, or a suitable resistor, in series with the existing one and putting 240 across them.

Why do you want a light in your saw anyhow?

Reply to
Toller

This is strange. A standard 220V circuit doesn't have 110 available anywhere. One of several things must be going on:

1) You've got a 3-wire 220V circuit. The plug you're using would then have 4 pins (hot, hot, neutral, and ground). Possible, but unlikely. 2) There's a 2:1 stepdown transformer in the machine to derive 110 for the lamp. Possible, but unlikely. 3) The diagram has you using the ground on a standard 220V circuit as one side of your 110 for the lamp. Dangerous.

I'm curious which it is.

Reply to
Roy Smith

Call a store that sells electric ovens.

Reply to
DJ Delorie

I like the first idea better.

There's nothing in theory wrong with the idea of a "suitable resistor", but it's gonna be a big one, because the power is going to split evenly between the bulb and the resistor. A 60W resistor is a pretty hefty item.

Might as well just make it a bulb and get some useful light out of it.

Reply to
Roy Smith

Forget trying to operate a 60W incandescent lamp at 240V, especially in this application.

Why? Simply because the lamp filament is so fine it won't tolerate the vibration found on a typical drill press.

Also, the cost, as you have found out, is prohibitive for small quantities.

Pull a neutral along with the two hots so that you can rewire the lamp holder to operate at 120V.

Don't want to do that, then rewire the lamp holder with it's own 120V cord and plug.

Can tell you a story about American Ship Building, owned by George Steinbrenner, yes the New York Yankees owner, then located in Lorain, Ohio, and how they used 240V incandescent lamps, more than $25,000/year of a single wattage, which today would be close to $40K.

Great labor relations story, but I digress.

HTH

Reply to
Lew Hodgett

Hello everyone,

Does this work? I am an electrical idiot, but this would solve my problem about putting a lamp in the pool shed that only has 220v with a ground and no neutral.

Is it as simple as running two 110 lights in series?

Thanks,

David.

Every neighbourhood has one, in mine, I'm him.

Remove the "splinter" from my email address to email me.

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Reply to
David F. Eisan

Exactly. Make sure they're the same wattage, though. Putting two bulbs of different wattages in series will do wierd stuff (light bulbs are very non-linear resistors).

Reply to
Roy Smith

Do you know anybody going to Europe? All their wiring is 220v and it looks like the bulb bases are the same size(Edison) as US. Have them bring you back a cheap present.

quantities.

Reply to
Dustmaker

Or just order some.

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Reply to
Roy Smith

You should use same wattage & type bulbs from the same manufacturer.

The cold resistance of a light bulb filament is much less than the hot resistance and this causes a much higher start-up current than steady state current. If one of your bulbs takes longer to heat up than the other, the slow one will experience a temporary voltage far in excess of 120V and this will shorten it's life. Sometime as drastically as the first time you turn it on.

Art

Reply to
Wood Butcher

There are a lot of step up/step down 110V/220V converters available for $10 or less. Safe and easy fix.

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Reply to
Rico

I should have read it before I sent it . . . . It's the fast one that gets the high voltage across it.

Art

Reply to
Wood Butcher

You could put a second bulb and run them in series, using standard 120v bulbs...

Bob Kaplow NAR # 18L TRA # "Impeach the TRA BoD" >>> To reply, remove the TRABoD!

Reply to
Bob Kaplow

An alternative is to install a rectifier (diode) in series with one of the power leads. This will reduce the effective power to the bulb by 1/2. You will need a diode with minimum current rating of 2 amps or so to be "safe" rated at 400 volts or better. An alternative is to install a dimmer (most are rated at 600 volts) and only turn it up half way 8^)

-Bruce

Reply to
Bruce

When I was in Europe (lived in Ireland for 9 months), all the light bulbs were bayonet based. They were great bulbs but would not work here. Its a good thought though.

Bob

Reply to
Bob Davis

I'm using ground to get the 110v. There's lots of good suggestions posted and no one liked the idea of using ground to get the 120v. Actually I didn't either.

I've got neutral available in the power panel less than 10 feet away, but I don't like the idea of running it just to use my worklight. That forces the drill press to stay fixed in this location unless I rewire.

The idea of a convertor seemed good at first, but there's the logistics of where to locate it. It would have to go outside the housing and require additional external wiring.

Running an extra resistance or another light bulb is academically sound, but not at all practical. I want to end up with a standard reliable light that gives reasonable, reliable bulb life and I sure don't want to burn extra power just to make my light bulb happy.

It seems the easiest solution is to bring the light wiring external and hook it to a separate 120 circuit. I've got plenty of them, since I did not skimp when rewiring the shop. For sure, it will meet code and avoid potential dangers.

Another alternative that no one mentioned is to mount an accessory worklight and forget the built-in one. That might actually be a good idea, as it would be one that could be moved around. the fixed location behind the chuck in the Jet is not the best location in the world.

Bob

Reply to
Bob Davis

Uh Toller, I did not ever mention putting a light on my saw. Its for my drill press.

Bob

Reply to
Bob Davis

Those solutions are too easy.

I had a similar problem when putting an hour meter on my compressor. Since the compressor is hard wired through seal tight I only needed to run a neutral in addition to the ground and power.

Reply to
Mark
[...]

I get them for about about 80 cents in every store...

Reply to
Juergen Hannappel

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