I'll admit to doing most of my cooking using a microwave oven: For my cooking it is usefully set-and-forget and minimises cleaning up!

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I'll admit to doing most of my cooking using a microwave oven: For my cooking it is usefully set-and-forget and minimises cleaning up!

I find the microwave to be most useful and it needs 120v.

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Some countries thought it wiser to put up with the inefficiencies of lower voltages over the greater risk of electrocution, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mains_electricity_by_country#/media/File:World_Map_of_Mains_Voltages_and_Frequencies,_Detailed.svg.

Anyhow I might just have a power nap now before anyone decides to interrupt me.

Cheers.

Thanks for that. Quite a mix!

And quite a strong suggestion of old empires...

The confusion for the wiring for China, Argentina and New Zealand looks rather dangerous for travelers!

And how did Japan get so hung up on frequency?!!

I thought Engineers were cooperative to make things work well!

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Sorry I have to step in here. Vic your box is 24 volt and is most of the US. We use a split phase system. You will see 3 wires going into your breaker box. 2 are hot and 1 common. In the breaker box are 2 rails. If you want a 110 circuit you connect to one rail and the common. But if you want 220/240 you connect to 2 rails. Notice the main on top and the larger breaker to the top right. Both those connect to both rails and are therefore 220/240. I see room for 2 addition 220/240 breakers. So you, like most people have the capacity to run 220/240.
Here is what your breaker box should or could look like inside.

Notice the red and black wires. Those are both 110/120 positive leads. The white is the common. Now notice the breaker on the right with a red and black wire. That is a 220/240 circuit.
We are on 220/240 to our homes.

Carlos, thanks for that.

Which then comes back to the question for the USA of how commonly available are 240V appliances?

For example, can you easily buy 240V ac reading lights, TVs, radios, PCs, battery chargers, etc?

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Green or bare is ground, red or black is hot, and white is neutral...

That ain't good for anyone with the all-too-common red-green colour blindness.

I once employed a technician who didn't mention that he was colour blind, even when I was explaining about the white, grey, green, red, yellow, blue, purple colour coding we had for the server rooms cables. We kept on seeing 'mistakes' where red and green cables were swapped around. The ends of the cables were connected correctly, but they were confusingly the wrong colour. I was suspicious that one of the team was being lazy and couldn't be bothered to trek to the storage to get the right cables. Until that is, I was in one of the rooms on a mission to fix all the cable colours and commandeered one of the responsible techies and... He was caught red handed when I asked for a green cable...

(Thankfully, these were data cables rather than anything more dangerous!)

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Winning before work.

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With each crime and every kindness we birth our future.

The confusion for the wiring for China, Argentina and New Zealand looks rather dangerous for travellers!

I can't comment on the danger, or otherwise of the wiring in Argentina or New Zealand, but the wiring in China can be highly suspect (at the best).

In "western style" hotels in major cities one could reasonably expect a fair standard of wiring, but in just about every hotel I stayed in there was at least one outlet not secured to the wall/cupboard that it was meant to be; this gave me a chance to see how such things were actually wired. "Bell" wire was not uncommon, no colour coding on the cores was not uncommon, loose connections was the norm, earth connected to a "live" pin was not uncommon, live core connected to the earth pin was common (with earth just dangling free). After my first visit I carried a set of decent screwdrivers and a test kit in my hold baggage and re-wired one outlet to as safe a standard as possible..... Interestingly enough, in the factories I visited the wiring was to a much higher standard.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

For example, can you easily buy 240V ac reading lights, TVs, radios, PCs, battery chargers, etc?

For most stuff 110v ac is the normal. If you were furnishing a apartment. Almost everything would be 110v ac.

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While making a Tuesday bedtime post I must say that I find Martin's observation about New Zealand's power interesting as it's the same power voltage network as we use and even the power point pin outs are in the same form and orientation as here (we can just plug in appliances from here over there).

Cheers.

The confusion for the wiring for China, Argentina and New Zealand looks rather dangerous for travelers!

Note the:

Table of mains voltages, frequencies, and plugs
wrote:

Argentina: Line/neutral reversed compared to Chinese and Australian/NZ
Australia: Line/neutral reversed compared to [Argentina]
China (mainland): Line/neutral reversed compared to [Argentina]
New Zealand: Line/neutral reversed compared to [Argentina]

For 'double insulated' AC devices, the line/neutral reversal doesn't matter. However, there may well be problems for a device that requires earthing...


As for the loose/broken hotel sockets: Isn't that following the trail of the vacuum cleaner?

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Winning with a 240v dryer, car charger, and dock boxes. I think that is all of my 240v connections.
240v lights, blenders, etc are not common. I never specify 240v circuits in the houses I build. You would need to special order anything 240v.

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Long long ago, I thought it was very wasteful to be using extra runs of 1.5mm^2 "twin+earth" copper cables just for the sake of connecting up a light switch. Far less wasteful would be to use light pipes or radio or infrared controllers to do away with the frivolous cable runs.

A good few years later and components are now readily available and low cost to allow us to do that so as to minimize the copper needed to wire up a house/building.

We have "Building Management Systems" ("BMS") for commercial buildings. Why not for domestic homes?

There are some good savings to be made there for reduced costs and improved convenience...

(Even more savings from also increasing the voltage so that less amps are needed and so the wire gauge requires less metal.)

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All Italian homes have 240 V. Of course you must have a power supply unit in your PCs.
Tullio

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Raspberry Pi anyone?

(Can run on batteries ;-) )


Lost in translation I think was the intended reminder that your PC PSU must be suitable for 240V ac or 120V ac, or both, as appropriate.

Recent switch mode PSUs are usually 110-250 V ac, and are fine for both 50Hz and 60Hz. That's a big step from the older heavier days of using single voltage transformers!

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Time for a brew!

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A Hump Day morning post.

Cheers.

And the race is on...

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Excellent wacky racing! Thanks :-)

Are there not a few more characters for that collection?...

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