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the uk pool heater

slacker
13 years ago

Yes I bought one of those uk pool heaters the O'blue 5 kw . I am in the US and need to know how to run the wires. The O'blue has three wires yet all the 240 vac i see have four wires. So do you just leave the the neutral off?

Thanks in advance guys/gals

Comments (16)

  • terribletom
    13 years ago

    All the 240V circuits I see have three wires -- two hots and an equipment ground. OTOH, all the 120/240V circuits I see have four wires (same as above, plus a neutral).

    The difference has to do with whether the appliance or equipment uses both 120V and 240V. If you take a common range/oven, for example, it uses 240V for the heating elements and 120V for stuff like the clock, timer, light, etc. Thus, it needs a 120/240V circuit -- four wires including a neutral for the 120V stuff. Ditto with a clothes dryer. The heating element is 240V but the light and sometimes the motor run on 120V.

    OTOH, a pure 240V load -- stuff like a heater (that is, a heater that doesn't need 120V for control circuitry), a 240V motor, a welder -- only needs a three-wire circuit.

    So yeah, if it's a pure 240V piece of equipment, no neutral is needed.

  • joed
    13 years ago

    It depends if the UK heater has one of the hots connected to ground.

  • Ron Natalie
    13 years ago

    It depends if the UK heater has one of the hots connected to ground.
    That's nonsensical. The UK heater will have three wires: hot, grounded conductor (neutral), and equipment ground. This would be the same as a 120V US circuit except at 220V.

    Note this heater specifically claims it requires 50HZ (though I can't imagine why, it's almost certainly purely resistive inside). Tehcnically, a 30A two pole GFCI breaker feeding this thing ought to work (or at least trip the GFCI), but it's unclear why you would want to put this chinese piece of non-listed crap in between a high voltage, high amperage power source and a body of water in which you are immersing yourself and your loved ones.

    It is a violation of the US electrical codes and most likely local law to use this.

  • joed
    13 years ago

    It's not nonsensical. Because a UK 240 device could have one of the hots connected to ground, just as neutral is grounded in US. That's a problem if you connect it to 240 in US.

  • Ron Natalie
    13 years ago

    It's not nonsensical. Because a UK 240 device could have one of the hots connected to ground, just as neutral is grounded in US. That's a problem if you connect it to 240 in US.
    No. You are talking drivel. You don't ground (or EARTH as they say) hots in the UK any more than you do in the US. That device has only one live (what we call hot), one neutral (they say neutral there), and one earth (what we call ground). They have 240 between line and neutral where we have 120V.

    The issue is, short of putting in a transformer, an average home has no 240-to-grounded conductor connection. Therefore, he might place it across two hots, to get 240.
    A GFCI can probably detect any failures he may have with that, but it remains that this is a chineese piece of junk, barely legal in the UK, and completely against any sense of legality or good sense in the US.

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    well thanks guys for the input, as far as I know there is not a mass electrocution going on in the UK with these devices, so with that information I think they might be safe to use. As far as why , well it come to economics, $120.00 delivered from the UK to my door or $2,000.00 for one here in the states . This is for one of those self setting pools Intex makes, and normally I would just tell the kids to suck it up and go swimming, as most of us did when we were small. However my son has special needs, and he has a very low body fat, thus he gets cold very very quickly. This is the only reason I am doing it.

    So let me get this right The three pole that comes from the UK one is hot one is nuetral and one is ground. So i would hook one hot (us) to one hot (uk) , the Other Hot(us) to the Neutral (uk) and then ground (us) to ground (uk) ?

    thanks inadvance

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    BUMP


    thanks

  • Ron Natalie
    13 years ago

    I already answered this. You want a 240V 30A GFCI breaker and 10g (two legs plus an insulated ground). Again, if you don't know the code and Article 680 specifically well enough to figure this out, you've probably got no business hooking up pool stuff. This is one area that DIY has very serious implications.

    This issue is designed for UK use, on UK power. It's instructions specifically mandate 50Hz power and the UK (240 live to neutral) voltage configurations. There it's probably safe. Yes the GFCI probably will protect you here but it's still ILLEGAL and penny foolish.

  • Ron Natalie
    13 years ago

    Buy the way, I didn't think I paid $2K even for my 10KW pool heater and I was right. You can easily get one that size legal for the US ones for right around $500 (including shipping).

    Of course, you're not willing to listen, so go ahead and do what you want.

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    WOW DAD IS THAT YOU?

    Thanks for the info I understand that you did answer but i did have a follow up that you may have missed it is up above.

    Thanks again for the info and the berating

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    what year is your Navion, I use to fly Falcon 50 and 900

  • Ron Natalie
    13 years ago

    1950 but I redid it about 5 years ago with the 300HP engine.

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Nice

  • brickeyee
    13 years ago

    "The issue is, short of putting in a transformer, an average home has no 240-to-grounded conductor connection."

    That does not matter either.

    No European equipment connects neutral to ground.

    You can use a US 240 V feed on it just fine, no transformer required.

    One hot goes to the equipment hot, the other to the equipment neutral (now a hot in the Edison US system) and ground is ground.

    The US made a decision a long time ago to use 120/240 V to limit voltage to ground for safety reasons.

    Europe preferred the wire savings of 240 V for all loads (not a lot of copper mines in Europe).

  • slacker
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    got it hooked up and works great. The more i looked in to this , it is the same way that all straight 240 lines are run

  • brickeyee
    13 years ago

    Folks seem to loose sight of the fat that voltage is measured between two pints,

    Many things operate just fine as long as the input voltage is correct without regard to how it appears on the wires.

    The equipment does not care if the 240 V is between a single wire and a neutral (grounded) conductors or two conductors 180 degrees out (Edison circuit).

    Older equipment with a neutral hooked to the chassis will result in a 'hot' chassis and may not operate, or short out one leg and trip the breaker.

    This has not been allowed in the US or Europe for many years though.

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