olddude
Member
- Location
- Richmond Va
Can someone explain to me the difference between a 208v 10000 watt element and a 10000 watt 240v element?
208v vs 240V heating element
- Thread starter olddude
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- Status
- Location
- New Jersey
- Occupation
- Journeyman Electrician
As far as heat output goes there is no difference when operated at rated voltage.
olddude
Member
- Location
- Richmond Va
That's what I was thinking. I built this powder coating oven a long time ago and At the time I was in a building that had three phase service and when I went to get my heating elements, and control parts I bought three 10000w heating kits. There were three different kits, one was rated 208v, there was one that was rated 208v-240v, then there was one that was 240v.
I knew I probably wouldn't stay at that location forever and didn't know if the next place I moved to would have 3 phase service so I bought the 208v-240v kits. I asked the sales person what the difference was between the three, he just said they were basically the same just different part numbers with a different price tag. Which is what I guess you guys are saying.
Well the oven has been in storage for over 15 years now and never used and now I have finally finished building my shop at home where I can set it up to do small powder coat jobs for people. When I built my house 20+ years ago I put in 400 Amp service knowing that one day I would build me a shop out back and I didn't want to have to add another service just for the shop. When I put the service in for my shop I took most of the circuits out of one box and added them to the other. I left a few of the circuits that don't get used as much like the kitchen oven, washer/dryer in the box I used for the shop. I just have to remember that I don't need to be washing and drying clothing and baking cookies at the same time I'm running my ovens and welding all at the same time in the shop.
I guess what I'm getting to is that my new shop is not 3 phase. I have rewired my controls from how I first built it for single phase but I would like to make it a portable unit. The reason for that is if it a portable unit I don't have to have a $60,000.00 fire suppression system on it. What I want to do is run 2) 50a welder circuits and 1) 4 wire 50a circuit over to the unit to feed my control panel. That way each burner would have it's own 50 amp circuit to run off of.
I've seen a couple other ovens wired this way only they just had one plug feeding the whole thing which seems to me a little to much for a single 50 a plug. Although I did test the oven with 1) 50 amp circuit before I moved it out of the first building and all three burners fired off along with the fan and lights and the oven got up to temp in around 15 min (350 degrees). During the test I was checking connections, circuit breakers and wiring to see if anything got hot. In the 20/25 min test nothing got hot or even warm to speak of but I still want to make sure what I'm doing is done in a safe manor. This large oven wont get used that much, once a week maybe at most. it will just get used when I get something too large for my smaller one.
- Location
- Placerville, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Retired PV System Designer
That is not what (at least most of us) were saying.
If properly labelled, the 208V heater kit will have a lower resistance than the 240V heater kit so that it can draw more current to keep the product of voltage and current (heating watts) the same in the different environment.
The 208-240 kit may be a little different. It either is really a compromise resistance value that produces more than 10KW at 240 and less than 10kW at 208, but closer at either value than the wrong single voltage kit would be OR there is an extra terminal on the 208-240V units so that you can connect to a heater configuration with the correct resistance for the voltage you are using at that time.
I have seen water heater elements with two terminals for wiring and a jumper that you use to bypass part of the coil when you connect to 208V.
- Location
- Massachusetts
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