Clothes dryer, do I have the correct power voltage...HELP!?

Question

Okay so I recently moved and I need a clothes dryer. The problem is that I have purchased 3 so far from good friends and family! All said that the dryers worked great before I got the. The trouble is that after I plug them in they seem to work great until I actually plaug them in... then they do not heat up!! They spin and seem to everything else right. I searched online and found that it could be a fuse or trouble with your circuit breaker. I checked our breaker and we don't use fuses and all circuits seem to be turned on! I am not sure what to do!! All the dryers can't have the same trouble... it's gotta be the power sourse! I also changed the cord in the back from 4 prong to 3 prong so it fits in the outlet!! What am I doing wrong?!!! Help!!

Answer 1

The three wires to the receptacle are two hot wires and one neutral wire. The dryer used one hot wire and the neutral to spin and for the controls. It uses both hot wires and no neutral to heat up. It sounds like one of your hot wires is not hot. Or not connected correctly. You should have a double (2 pole) circuit breaker for the dryer. Make sure they are both on. Turn that circuit breaker all the way off and then back on. Make sure you are connecting the cord correctly inside the dryer. Including the grounding jumper. The two outside wires in the cord are the hot wires, the center wire is the neutral. If none of that works, call an electrician to tell you what's wrong. Be very careful with electricity. It can kill.

Answer 2

The dryer actually uses 2 circuits for power, drawing on both sides of the service that come into the house for 220 V.

If you looked at the breakers and they APPEARED on that does not mean that one breaker didn't pop. You should figure out which breaker goes to the dryer and flip it over and back to make sure that both circuits are live. Depending on the circuit breakers, some of them don't look popped especially when held in place by the other breaker which did not open.

If the dryers worked before and do not work now, then you are correct - logically the problem is with your power source. So, you could have a faulty outlet, a blown or faulty breaker, or something is wired incorrectly. If one half of the system works and the other does not, then the dryer will either run the motor and controls and have no power for heating elements or be unable to run at all.

If you changed the power cord, you could try changing it back and instead getting one of the adapters used to plug the different outlets into a non-matching receptacle. Double check all of your wiring changes.

It is a dryer so this is not so easy but the best way to know for sure is to plug it in to someone else's house to verify it works if all else fails. It seems highly likely that it is something in the house circuitry after trying more than one dryer, though, so you should call an electrician if you are not up to the task of dealing with the problem yourself. Be careful! The voltages are more than enough to kill you if you accidentally wire something wrong and energize the dryer housing.

Answer 3

Clothes Dryer Voltage

Answer 4

Sounds to me like you might have disconnested one of the hot wires when you changed the power cord. In which case you would get the 120V needed for a motor but not the 220V needed for the heating element.When you changed the cord you should have either two black wires going to the two side prongs or a black and a red. The third, center prong would be connected to the white wire and preferably have the whites and green or bare ground. On the 220V breaker it is actually two breakers side by side. both need to be on. Easiest way to check voltag is withs a multimeter. Have seen some as cheap as $7 that caan do the job. Set the AC voltage range to whichever range it has above 220. Usually 500V. The AC is marked with a squiggle above a straight line. Put the two probes into the outlet in the two opposite openings. You should read 220V, about anyway. Could be anywhere from 205 - 250. Next put one in one side and one in the center opening. Should be about 120V. Then do the other side should be about the same. If noy you need to trace out the problem.

Answer 5

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RE:
Clothes dryer, do I have the correct power voltage...HELP!?
Okay so I recently moved and I need a clothes dryer. The problem is that I have purchased 3 so far from good friends and family! All said that the dryers worked great before I got the. The trouble is that after I plug them in they seem to work great until I actually plaug them in... then they do...

Answer 6

The older dryers used a three pronged wire. 220 volts and a ground wire (then the machine splits the voltage to 110 volts for the controls. The new dryers are designed to accept 110 volts from the outlet. Changing the cord was a smart thing to think of, but, it didn't change anything. Either buy an older dryer, and change the recept back, or run a new four wire source wire to the laundry area and use the four wire plug..

Answer 7

Back in the day before mechanical dryers, families would dry their cloths on a cloths line. The cloths line would be a rope placed between two poles. The rope and poles would be in a yard outside the home. The cloths line would utilize both solar and wind. Amazing how history teaches.

Answer 8

If they are spinning, then the power supply must be OK. If you had to change the plug on the cord, that suggests they were designed for another country. If this is the case, find out what the voltage is in that country, and whether it is the same as yours. If it is different, then they will not work properly. I would advise you to buy a new one at a local store.

Answer 9

First thing you need to do is find out what kind of voltage is coming from the outlet. Just follow the directions for your electric gauge. Then we can go from there.