Gm1234 wrote:
"Edwin Pawlowski" wrote

Each wire should be 110 to ground, 220 if you contact both of them. The
thermostat is breaking just one wire. If it is the stat, you can get heat
by twisting the two wires together.


This is what I would have thought, but the puzzle is that I get the 110v to
ground, but not 220v across the hot conductors. ...

That indicates both "hot" wires are connected to the same phase
somewhere -- either at the fuse box or at some other junction box,
somebody made a wiring mistake and got both of them on the same side.