I have a shed at a rental house that has a 220v dryer hook-up. I want to take power off one of the 220v hot legs for the washer. Assuming I use the 10 ga. wire to the washer OL, is there anything wrong with doing this without using a subpanel? Somebody said I would mess up the “balance” of the power supply to the dryer.
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Don't do it!!
[Later]: IGNORE the following, see Bill's message!
[Earlier] Size of the feed to the 110 outlet doesn't matter so much, the washer would be overfused.
I don't think you have to worry about the "balance" of the neutral, dryer circuits are designed to run 110 circuits (like the timer circuit in the dryer and, I believe, the motor circuit) but the washer or whatever you plugged into that circuit would be overfused and it could start a fire.
Also, any major appliance circuit should only have one device on it, per building codes.
You would screw up thre balance of a 220 circuit that doesn't use a neutral, like many central A/C circuits.
And, of course, you should never do any wiring if you don't follow applicable building codes!
________________________________________________
"I may have said the same thing before... But my explanation, I am sure, will always be different." Oscar Wilde
Edited 11/28/2002 6:43:49 PM ET by Bob Walker
Edited 11/28/2002 6:46:20 PM ET by Bob Walker
My guess is that this is an older installation and it is only 3 wires. That is it does not have a separate ground.
Also if this is a separate building I think that it is illegal without a sub-pannel to start with, but I would need to read the code to sure.
What about lights. Are there any lights in the building?
Bill,
Good point: if the dryer uses a three prong plug, the ground and neutral are combined so tour "extended" 110 outlet wouldn't be grounded.________________________________________________
"I may have said the same thing before... But my explanation, I am sure, will always be different." Oscar Wilde
Yup, there is something wrong with it.
I assume this is a 30A branch? Well, you can only install 20A receptacles on 20A circuits, and 15A receptacles on 15A or 20A circuits. Even if the wiring to them is 10 AWG.
There's an exception for short taps (18 inches or less) to fixtures and other non-receptacles outlets, but that doesn't apply here.
If this is a 10-3 with ground circuit, you can put in a small subpanel with a 15A or 20A breaker for the 110V washer circuit. If this is an older style 10-2 with ground, where the neutral is connected to the appliance frame ( not sure if they ever did this for dryers, now against code, and not very safe), then you're SOL.