"Doug White" wrote in message
...
Keywords:
In article , "Carl Boyd"
wrote:

"Don Young" wrote in message
...

"Doug White" wrote in message
...
Now that I have established some metal content, I have a question about
my screwy house wiring. The knowledge base here is about as broad as
it
gets, so I figure soembody will have some ideas.

We have an outlet in our dining room that appears to be a 220V 15A
duplex
outlet. It looks like a regular 110V 15A grounded outlet, except the
blades for the plugs are both horizontal. It was presumably installed
for a large window air conditioner before central air was installed.
It
is live, and I measured ~220V AC with a DVM across the two blades.

I'd like to convert this to a regular 115V 15A outlet. I assumed that
I
would find a dual lever 15A breaker in the panel box, and that I could
just connect one of the hot leads to neutral and install a single phase
breaker. I haven't had time to take the breaker box cover off the
breakers, but there are NO 15A dual breakers in the box.

I'll pop the cover in a day or so when I have time. In the meantime,
does anyone have any idea what I should be looking for inside the box
that might identify the related breaker? I've got a breaker tracing
gadget, but it's designed to plug into a 115V outlet. There is also no
guarantee that the outlet & breaker hookup were done correctly. I
don't
know if the "ground" hole in the outlets is connected to a real ground
or
neutral, or how to tell.

Thanks for any help or ideas.

Doug White
You should have two breakers that will kill the 220 (or 230 or 240)
volts
between the two blade connections. There should be a double breaker but
it
is not unknown for someone to install two separate ones. You should find
them feeding conductors in the same cable, one of which may be white. If
there is a white, it should become the neutral. If there is not a white,
you should apply white sleeving, tape, or other identification to the
neutral at both the breaker box and the outlet.

If you are using a digital voltmeter, do not be surprised if the voltage
does not go all the way to zero when the breakers are switched OFF.

Don Young

I think Don is pretty much right, but it is also possible that someone has
hooked a 15 Amp outlet to a higer rated double breaker. Make sure you
mark
the neutral white to stay within code and keep the next guy from doing
similar head scratching.

This is pretty close to what I found. I popped the faceplate off the
outlet, and checked it with a flashlight. There's a black wire going to
one side, a green wire going to ground, but a WHITE wire going to the
other side. No sign I could see of red tape or other indication that
it's not a neutral. So much for wiring to code... The wires look to be
12 gauge, but it's hard to tell. They just look a little beefy to be 14
gauge.

At the breaker box, I found a dual 20 amp breaker that wasn't labeled. I
flipped that, and sure enough, the outlet (both sides) goes dead.

So, I've got what appears to be a 20 amp 220V circuit with a 15 amp
outlet & wiring incorrectly color coded. I'll get a single 20 amp
breaker, move the white wire in the breaker box to neutral, replace the
outlet & I should be all set. I haven't taken the cover off the breaker
box yet, and my only concern is having a long enough neutral wire to
reach. My recollection is that splices in the box are a no-no.

Thanks for all the suggestions & ideas. It didn't turn out to nearly as
weird as it could have been.

Doug White
Do not use a single 15A outlet on a 20A breaker. Assuming the wire is 12ga,
use 15A or 20A breaker and outlet together.

Don Young