Moronic Ethernet Cable Question for Home Office Setup

[Ego]

Is there a difference in plugs? I don't know these things; but the outlet is the same now at 110 as it was at 220. This time around I installed a surge protector with EPO.

It sounds like he saw your regular 30amp or 50amp RV plug/outlet and mistook it for a 220v outlet, so he ran 220 without checking. They look somewhat similar.

[AxelHeyst]

A 220 will have two hots, a neutral, and a ground whereas a 110 will have a one hot, a neutral, and a ground. It sounds like he wired a 220 circuit into a 110 receptacle, hence the real electrician not changing it. Or you have the wrong plug on your 110 circuit.

I had a heck of a time wrapping my head around this stuff recently. Is the following correct?

In the US, a 240v split single phase panel will have two hots (which are 120v and -120v), a 'neutral', and a ground coming out of it.

A true 240v-only appliance will have only the two hots and the ground going to it. The 'neutral' will not run to that appliance.

A 120v appliance will have one of the hots, the neutral, and the ground going to it.

A 240v/120v appliance will have two hots, a neutral, and ground going to it, because it's basically a 240v appliance and a 120v appliance in the same box. Many appliances like washer machines are like this, I think.

(For fun: in the US, 240v single phase nonsplit has just a hot, a neutral, and ground. The potential between the neutral and ground is 240v. Another way to think of 240v nonsplit is that the hot and neutral are both hots... but I'm not sure if that makes it less confusing or more.)

So Raul would have run the two hots and ground to the 110 outlet, if indeed that's the receptacle was, when he should have run one hot, the neutral, and the ground, to the outlet, right?

Explanation for the pedantry: I'm wiring up a 240v nonsplit inverter to run a single phase 240v pump and had a devil of a time wrapping my head around 120/240 single phase split vs. nonsplit wiring. If I got this right, I'll feel better about not blowing up my pump when I plug it all in.

A diagram.

[ffj]

I can't access your diagram.

The problem started at the electrical panel. He put a double-pole breaker in two slots which captured both hot phases, hence the 240 volts. There is nothing inherently wrong with that other than a 120 volt system was needed, which a single pole breaker would have accomplished. The fact that he put 10 gauge wire in also means that he meant to run the circuit at 240 volts.

My question would be did he run a 10-2 or a 10-3 wire? A 10-2 will have two hots, usually colored black and red, and a ground. A 10-3 will have the same with the addition of a white neutral. And the next question I would ask is what did the receptacle and plug look like? Because of the wire size and configuration of a 10-3 it is really hard to mess this up simply because it won't fit correctly if you mix and match. So I am really curious how he made this connection work.

But there may be another explanation because we don't know how the shoreline is wired for the camper. It might be an innocent mistake on Raul's part. Keep in mind without seeing everything I am speculating. The question is why was a 120 V circuit allowed to plug into a 240V one?

What is confusing in the electrical world is the presence of different configurations based upon the electrical code at the time. A new dryer or stove outlet will have two hots, a neutral and a ground. But older ones will have two hots and a ground only. You mention above a nice assortment of options and really you have to start with the requirements of the appliance or machine and how it was configured. There should be a schematic with the instructions or on the motor itself.

To answer your question I need to know what the inverter is for? Why not just wire directly to the pump?

[AxelHeyst]

Thanks for the response, reading how you think through it is helpful.

It's an off grid, dedicated PV system to run the pump. Solar panels > 12v batteries > inverter > 240v pump. I don't actually have a question about that, just mentioning it for context why I'm asking detailed questions about 240v circuits. I found all kinds of information about split phase 240 circuits, but my inverter is *not* split phase. In other words, there's no way to wire the output from it to get 120v.

[Ego]

The old 3-plug 240v dryer outlets have three wires. The left below is the old 240V, the right below is the RV 30a, 120v.



They are roughly the same size. I'd don't know but I'd be willing to bet that they still use the old 3-wire 240v dryer outlets in Mexico as the old appliances cross the border.

ETA See: https://ask-the-electrician.com/wiring- ... er-outlet/

I guess the question is, did you supply the outlet or did Raul buy it? If he bought an RV outlet clearly marked 120v and then wired it 220v because you said you wanted to connect your trailer to 220..... then he had to at least understand that something was not quite right with the setup. The RV pigtails look kinda like the dryer plugs so I can see how he may have made the mistake. But it takes a bit of willful ignorance on his part as well.

On the other-other hand, he may have been thinking, "The gringo called me and not the real electrician because he wanted someone willing to do this crazy job..."

[ffj]

@Ego

We need pictures to solve this mystery. I want to see both plug and receptacle. I won't be able to have a nice Christmas until we figure this out.

[Hristo Botev]

I will send pictures tomorrow. I don’t want to ruin anyone’s Christmas.

[Hristo Botev]

@Ego

We need pictures to solve this mystery. I want to see both plug and receptacle. I won't be able to have a nice Christmas until we figure this out.

As promised.

This is the receptacle as installed by Raul. The electrician made some sort of change to the wiring at the receptacle, but he did not change the plug receptacle.


This is the subpanel currently, with the electrician's changes. I don't have a before pic, showing Raul's work, but IIRC, the breaker covered both slots 5 and 6, and the electrician changed the wiring so that the breaker is only on slot 5.


Male end of RV extension cord:


Female end of RV extension cord:


Where the extension cord is plugged into at the Airstream (I can attest to the warning message):

[AxelHeyst]

So:
Raul installed a dual-pole, 240v breaker (occupying slots 5 and 6).
Probably, Raul used 10-3 wire, taking two hots, neutral, and ground to the 110 receptacle. He connected two hots and ground to the receptacle, meaning there was 240v going to it.

Electrician friend replaced the dual-pole breaker with a single pole and covered slot 6 with the plastic cover.
At the receptacle, electrician friend removed one of the hot connections and connected the neutral, so there's 110v at it now.
Presumably (?), if it was indeed 10-3 wire, there is now a hot that is not connected to anything.

Alternatively, Raul might have used 10-2 wire. In that case, he would have had two hots and ground going to the receptacle. Electrician friend would have taken one of the 'hot' lines from that and connected it to neutral instead, at the panel. But based on the fact that electrician friend changed some wiring at the receptacle, this is less likely the case?

Does that sound right?

[Ego]

I thought there may have been a somewhat rational explanation for Raul's action. I am now convinced he was drunk.

[ffj]

@axel

Pretty much as you described. We just don't know which wire configuration he used but it doesn't really matter.

So the plug and receptacle are meant for each other (mystery solved), Raul just wired it incorrectly. I'm guessing at one time the voltage rating was readable on the plug, like this new one:



Thanks Hristo. I can now have a good Christmas.

[Hristo Botev]

As a quick update, the powerline adaptor (pic below) continues to work well for my backyard trailer camper office set up. I've got an ethernet cable plugged in to a docking station and another into a wifi router that my cell phone runs off of. Have had many video conference calls and have not had a problem; also haven't had any noticable issues with watching videos via youtube or wherever. I ended up opting NOT to use the powerline for the TV inside the main house (TV is on a different wall than where the modem/router are set up), and instead just ran an ethernet cable across the floor hidden under a rug (with a channel cut in the rug pad to make it flush), as I was worried the download speeds wouldn't have been great for heavier video and music streaming. But it works great for the office.

[jacob]

DW's work demands using an ethernet cable for security reasons, so I'll be following this thread.

We ended up with a 50' ethernet cable taped to the floor (mostly covered with rugs) going from the outlet to the computer(s). <$15 ... and they come flat these days The money saved went into a KVM switch. She was rather envious of mine.