I was looking at a commercial deep fryer and noticed that all the models offered were 208V & and each leg was of equal amps except one, that particular unit listed 2 of the legs at 22 amps and the other at 36 amps. I could not see any glaring differences in the units besides a small size difference. Why would there be such a substantial amp draw difference on 1 leg compared to the other two?
Why is one leg higher than the other?
- Thread starter mmas0n
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- Tennessee NEC:2017
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- Semi-Retired Electrician
Just a guess, but it sounds like there is a line to neutral load and that one leg is carrying that load.
gadfly56
Senior Member
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- New Jersey
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- Professional Engineer, Fire & Life Safety
I suppose it could be the electronic controller for the fryer, but I can't imagine any controller sucking up 15 amps.
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- Placerville, CA, USA
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- Retired PV System Designer
They may have needed to use a combination of individual heating elements that would not allow them to balance the load precisely. (For example, 7 resistance heating elements do not divide evenly by three.)
hmspe
Senior Member
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- Temple, TX
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- PE
Sounds to me like they have a unit with two heating elements. For single phase the elements would be paralleled. For "three phase" one element would be connected A-B and the other B-C. Phases A and C would each see one element but phase B would see both. Because of phase shift the load on B is about 1.7 X the load of a single element.
I'm leaning this way myself. 22A x sqrt(3) = 38A. The nameplate (or spec's) say 36, so there could be a small load across the otherwise open end of the delta configuration... or if 4-wire, some 120V load on the uncommon 208 lines.
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