"MiamiCuse" wrote in message
...

"dpb" wrote in message ...
MiamiCuse wrote:
"RBM" wrote in message
...
Your newer dryer plug is a dryer plug. your older one, with the three
straight blades, is an range plug

My range plug is three straight blades, but they are all oriented
"north-south". The three straight blades on my dryer plug is not all in
the same direction. The top middle one is oriented "north-south" but
the other two are angled.

The new plug has the same two bottom blades, just the top middle one is
"L" shaped.
...
It's not whether it's range or dryer, it's the amp-rating of the plug
that's the difference.

The straight-blade is 50A, the one w/ the L is 30A.

Assuming the new implies new manufactured not just new to you and so the
30A plug is OEM and the existing wall circuit is wired properly for 30A
or greater, then you can correctly do either--change the outlet or change
the plug.

The requirement is that the plug be rated for at least the amperage of
the appliance/load and the circuit must, of course, be capable of that
load. 50A would have been a little unusual for a normal dryer hookup but
using the higher-rated plug is ok.

If the old dryer plug is of the detachable kind rather than molded in,
you could just swap it to the new dryer; if they're both molded probably
just as well to change out the wall plug to match the new dryer.

--

Thanks.

My older dryer no longer works, and it has the molded outlet plug. I have
a new dryer laying around in the new (being remodeled house) so I figure I
will move that here but the plug does not work.

I did not check to see if the outlet is working, in other words, it may be
broken so that's why the old dryer does not start. I am trying to figure
out how I can determine if that outlet has current. The only thing that
plugs into it is my dryer and it won't start. I am not sure which circuit
it is (some of mine are not labeled).

I have a multimeter that can check voltage on a regular outlet (120v) but
I plugged that into the dryer outlet and get nothing.but I am not sure the
pins are sticking all the way in correctly.

So I think I need to determine if my dryer outlet is working or not, and I
don't know how to do that with the older dryer not working and the new
dryer not pluggable. If I can test that then I can check with breaker and
that would tell me the amp for that circuit. I think it's 30amp.

It sounds like you may not have 240 volt at the outlet. Use your tester
between the ground/neutral and each of the hot legs. You should get 120
volts. If you don't get 120 volts from each hot leg to ground, you won't get
any reading when you test between the two hot legs. This would likely be the
reason that the existing dryer isn't working