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2?0vac@50hz appiiances on 240vac@60hz

John Frum

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Nov 30, 2019
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I't my understanding that in the uk and/or europe a tea kettle can draw ~3 killowatts.
Thats double what my north american tea kettle can draw.

Pretty sure I could just swap plugs or hardwire it to 240VAC@60hz.

All this to get my coffee 90 seconds sooner.

UPDATE: 240VAC@60hz
 
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Yea, that would work. I'm just not sure where you will find 50 Hz around here :), not that frequency matters for a resistance heating element.

I've done something a bit different, connected 115V to a 230V water heater or dryer. This let me run a large size water heater on an extension cord without replacing the elements. Half the current, a quarter the power.

For coffee, I don't even wait 90 seconds. A timer turns on the espresso machine before I get up. ☕
 
The UK has 230v 32 amp circuits. In older houses odds on it's one of their horrible ring circuits where the cable runs all the way around various outlets then loops back to the fusebox where the far end is connected as well, ie a ring. The appliance's plug has a suitably rated fuse inside.

Make sure you connect the ground wire when changing the plug to suit your 220 VAC outlet.

My kettle is 2.2kW but I still prefer to just slap the mug in the microwave and zap it for ~90s.
 
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Most free standing electric stoves are 240V. I wouldn't expect a single burner to be more than 1800W so wouldn't be much faster than your coffee pot. Typically an electric range outlet is 50A, so full load should only be 40A or 10 kW for four burners and an oven.

But here's a single "burner" 230V 5000W induction cooktop:


It does weight 180 lbs ...

Part of the power will be used heating the metal pot, so no all goes into the water.
 
Most free standing electric stoves are 240V. I wouldn't expect a single burner to be more than 1800W so wouldn't be much faster than your coffee pot. Typically an electric range outlet is 50A, so full load should only be 40A or 10 kW for four burners and an oven.

But here's a single "burner" 230V 5000W induction cooktop:


It does weight 180 lbs ...

Part of the power will be used heating the metal pot, so no all goes into the water.

And its only $700.00USD :)
 
But here's a single "burner" 230V 5000W induction cooktop:
Part of the power will be used heating the metal pot, so no all goes into the water.
Actually, in an induction heater, ALL the power goes into heating the metal, then the metal heats the water. :)
 
"Bunn not Bitter" The Bunn brand coffee pots make a full 10-12 cups in less than 3 minutes. They also continuously keep the water hot at all times. Used one for years and was the first person in the office every morning. Turn off the alarm, grounds, water its going. Walk into the office turn on lights press computer power button, walk back, milk, sugar, pour.

The downside is you dont get to go all Tim the tool man taylor on your coffee pot.s-l400.jpg
 
Actually, in an induction heater, ALL the power goes into heating the metal, then the metal heats the water. :)

Yea, I know.
I was just concerned that once it reached thermal equilibrium, too much energy would be wasted heating that heavy metal pot.
But it turns out the specific heat of steel is 0.5 J/(g degree-C), while for water it is 4 J/(g degree-C) so not such a big concern.



(The goal here is to over-engineer this problem, right?)

I do have a near-instantaneous solution to smoothJoey's problem, based on the things I learned about Trident/Ohio, but it'll be a bit of work to put together.
 
An interesting thread here. We currently have a Duxtop 1800 watt max single induction plate/burner. We are supplying the two 6v batteries configured to produce 12v with panels which have been stated to provide 570 watts total. Our inverter is 3000 watts and the 4 awg wire from the positive battery is connected to the 400 amp slow burn fuse then a 300 amp circuit breaker/resettable fuse. When we turn on the induction burner, initially default setting is 5, the 300 amp circuit breaker/resettable fuse trips. If we start at 1, lowest setting, then slowly increase the 'heat' the breaker does not trip. Our main breaker box where the 115 vac power comes from has a 20 amp breaker and we are wired with 12/3 wire throughout the van. We are just trying to figure out why the inline resettable breaker/fuse after the 400 amp from batteries to inverter keeps tripping. Any suggestions? (initial solar system in our current van) Thanks!
 
An interesting thread here. We currently have a Duxtop 1800 watt max single induction plate/burner. We are supplying the two 6v batteries configured to produce 12v with panels which have been stated to provide 570 watts total. Our inverter is 3000 watts and the 4 awg wire from the positive battery is connected to the 400 amp slow burn fuse then a 300 amp circuit breaker/resettable fuse. When we turn on the induction burner, initially default setting is 5, the 300 amp circuit breaker/resettable fuse trips. If we start at 1, lowest setting, then slowly increase the 'heat' the breaker does not trip. Our main breaker box where the 115 vac power comes from has a 20 amp breaker and we are wired with 12/3 wire throughout the van. We are just trying to figure out why the inline resettable breaker/fuse after the 400 amp from batteries to inverter keeps tripping. Any suggestions? (initial solar system in our current van) Thanks!

300 amps is crazy big for a thermal breaker.
Is this a cheap amazon or ebay breaker per chance?
 
Anyway 4 awg wire is only rated for 160 amps.
I really hope you mean 4/0 awg.
If not then your system is a fire hazzard.
 
12 volt system, cheapie breakers and/or the typical phase angle control used with induction heating is behind it, upsetting the inverter causing it to momentarily draw a lot of currrent as it tries to cope with the poor power factor. Toss in losses in the DC cabling pushing current demand higher and we might have the answer.

These style of fake knock offs are usually horribly over rated. For fun I bought some '200 amp' rated ones. They couldn't even hold up 80 amps for 15 mins.
 
Understand.
This is a 12 volt system.

After reading the responses I believe I will research a 'better' choice for the resettable fuse.
12 volt system, cheapie breakers and/or the typical phase angle control used with induction heating is behind it, upsetting the inverter causing it to momentarily draw a lot of currrent as it tries to cope with the poor power factor. Toss in losses in the DC cabling pushing current demand higher and we might have the answer.

These style of fake knock offs are usually horribly over rated. For fun I bought some '200 amp' rated ones. They couldn't even hold up 80 amps for 15 mins.
 
This is a 12 volt system.

After reading the responses I believe I will research a 'better' choice for the resettable fuse.

I don't think anyone makes affordable quality thermal breakers rated at more than 200 amps.
 
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