How to wire up a 240VAC receptacle

[C]

Looks like you like to ignore simple facts.

In the USA the standard electrical outlet is 110-120 volts 60hz.

All 220-240 volt stuff uses different connectors. Because of the difference people take more care.

Think of how many people in the USA have used computer power cords. For the USA the end that connects to a computer is 115volts. For a lot of the world that is 220volts but not in USA.

So now you have people seeing the computer end thinking 115volts and connecting an extension cord to your PDU, but that is not 115 volts. A part of safe is knowing what to expect.
So what is a safe European standard is not as safe in the USA due to common thought.

The added transformer is creating a safe NON-USA standard in addition to wasting power. That transformer will get hot, and that is a waste of power. 

One thing you might like to know is that 220 volt 60hz is more dangerous then 220 volt 50hz. The 60hz has a greater chance of messing up your heart beat then 50hz.

If you want real safe 220 volts using a USA split phase( 220 Volts with a neutral center tap) you use a four wire connection. The forth connection the safety ground.
Unlike the rest of the world USA 220 volt equipment often has some 115 volt loads.

C

[Richard Crowley]

So, I run both "phases" or "mains" into H1 and H7, after tying them together?   

No. If you "tie both phases together" you will put a dead short across your utility mains power and instantly trip the breaker. 
Hopefully the breaker will protect you before starting a fire and burning down your house.

and then neutral into H10 and H4 together?

No. The neutral plays no part here.  You only need the neutral line if you want 120V.

The only way you can get 240 volts to feed into the transformer is between the two "phases".
One "phase" goes to H1-H7, and the other "phase" goes to H4-H10

Neutral goes to X1 and X4 is your single-phase 240V to feed your PDU.

[Richard Crowley]

So now you have people seeing the computer end thinking 115volts and connecting an extension cord to your PDU, but that is not 115 volts. A part of safe is knowing what to expect.

Yes the IEC 60320 power connector (the standard connector on computers, printers, etc.) is ambiguous because it is used for both 120V and for 240V connections.  The only protection here is that the HPE PDU is a specialty product in a special environment where only people who know better will be plugging things into it.

The added transformer is creating a safe NON-USA standard in addition to wasting power. That transformer will get hot, and that is a waste of power. 

Yes. Alas that is true whenever you must convert power from one voltage to another.

One thing you might like to know is that 220 volt 60hz is more dangerous then 220 volt 50hz. The 60hz has a greater chance of messing up your heart beat then 50hz.

I would like to see some reference for that.  It doesn't make sense from other evidence.

If you want real safe 220 volts using a USA split phase( 220 Volts with a neutral center tap) you use a four wire connection. The forth connection the safety ground. Unlike the rest of the world USA 220 volt equipment often has some 115 volt loads.

The modern standard for North America ALWAYS requires a safety ground (BrEnglish: "protective earth") connection.  THe modern convention is a green wire with yellow stripe.

The presence of the safety ground does NOT make a product like that HPE PDU "safe".  Because the PDU was designed with the assumption that Neutral is essentially zero volts.  Connecting it to USA split phase will put Neutral at 120V which is unsafe for this PDU.  The presence of the safety ground does not change this problem.

[tpowell1830]

Patience is often referred to as a virtue... if so then Mr. Crowley is very virtuous.

 

[Spork Schivago]

Remind me what this is all for?

IMO by the time you get to several kW of computer gear in the basement, it's time to start looking for a proper data center.

This is a datacenter.   Our datacenter.   We are just running it out of the house for now, instead of renting a building in a commercial zone.   We've already okay-ed it with the city, before we purchased the house.   We can have a sign in the window, but can't put a big sign outside, other than that, we're good.

We used to rent a few servers over the internet, but that got to the point where it was no longer cost effective.

[james_s]

That's surprising with the trends these days, even medium sized companies are outsourcing their server needs to cloud based suppliers. One of the places I worked years ago we had our own servers but leased a rack at a collocation center a few blocks away. They provided the power, cooling and data, we racked and maintained our hardware. 

[Spork Schivago]

Looks like you like to ignore simple facts.

In the USA the standard electrical outlet is 110-120 volts 60hz.

All 220-240 volt stuff uses different connectors. Because of the difference people take more care.

Think of how many people in the USA have used computer power cords. For the USA the end that connects to a computer is 115volts. For a lot of the world that is 220volts but not in USA.

So now you have people seeing the computer end thinking 115volts and connecting an extension cord to your PDU, but that is not 115 volts. A part of safe is knowing what to expect.
So what is a safe European standard is not as safe in the USA due to common thought.

The added transformer is creating a safe NON-USA standard in addition to wasting power. That transformer will get hot, and that is a waste of power. 

One thing you might like to know is that 220 volt 60hz is more dangerous then 220 volt 50hz. The 60hz has a greater chance of messing up your heart beat then 50hz.

If you want real safe 220 volts using a USA split phase( 220 Volts with a neutral center tap) you use a four wire connection. The forth connection the safety ground.
Unlike the rest of the world USA 220 volt equipment often has some 115 volt loads.

C

We need 240VAC, again, for the server, not 220VAC, although it would run on 220VAC.   Most of our equipment is NOT from the USA.   The cords to power these devices are NOT what you find with a NORMAL USA bought PC, so I highly doubt anyone who is allowed to be around the rack will try plugging anything into the PDU.    I mean, simple fact, strangers aren't going to be down here, and if they are, they're breaking the law.   Eventually, we have to worry about my daughter, but that's a long ways away, and even then, she cannot physically get into the rack to plug anything into the PDU.   Ohm's law shows us if we double the volts, we cut the current draw in half.   200v * 2 amp = 400 watts.   20 amp * 20v = 400 watts.    I think I'd rather get shocked, if I had to get shocked, at the 200v, 2 amp, rather than the 20 amp.

I have no idea how anyone is going to plug any cords into the PDU, I don't know what you think the inputs look like, but you physically cannot take a normal PC cord and plug it into the PDU.   You need special cords....most of our energy hungry equipment is designed to run off 240VAC, but most of it can go down to 100VAC.   I mean, we have some American made workstations, but they're not going into the rack at all, and aren't being powered by this PDU.   A lot of stuff came from Germany.   There's usually no switch on these pieces of equipment to flip.   They say 100VAC - 240VAC.

I mentioned in a previous post that security was our responsibility and we get audited, where some people from some companies come in and check to make sure everything is up to their standard.   We get a report on what needs to change, if anything, and it's our responsibility to change what they list.   Once we wire up the 15kVA transformer (or higher someone to wire it up for us), we'll have to have yet another one of those pesky audits.

There's security in place.  Maybe you can take comfort in knowing that currently, no one who is specifically supposed allowed in the datacenter can get into the datacenter without doing a lot of illegal work?   This isn't a playroom.   The idea is though, we do our own thing once these contracts are up, and hopefully, later on in life, our daughter takes interest.   If not, that's okay, we'll love and accept her no matter what.   That's years down the road before we burn that bridge though.

Heck, do you know how hard it was to say no to the three phase installation?   We were talking over 50,000$ and almost went for it, because then we can purchase stuff that's a bit more suited to our task at hand.   I feel better having a PDU hooked up with a backup sitting on the shelf in case one shits the bed, rather than daisy chaining a whole bunch to try and get my systems running.

[Spork Schivago]

That's surprising with the trends these days, even medium sized companies are outsourcing their server needs to cloud based suppliers. One of the places I worked years ago we had our own servers but leased a rack at a collocation center a few blocks away. They provided the power, cooling and data, we racked and maintained our hardware.

We got something similar going here.   One of the companies we can see from our house, but they're really big.   They try to use resources in the community, and have helped my city a lot.   Here, we outsource to Microsoft for some of our needs.   We use a CSP license and have Enterprise E3 editions running.   Our exchange server is on a Microsoft server, our active directory is on a Microsoft server.   Heck, even our conference calls go through Microsoft!   However, there's stuff we have to make sure doesn't get uploaded to the Microsoft server or any of our VPSes.   Stuff that has to stay local.   We have a fancy switch for that, that has routing capabilities and we segregate / isolate different networks, some with access to the outside world, some without.   That way, we keep the residential stuff on the residential side, the business machines that are supposed to have internet access can reach our gateway, and the machines that are not supposed to, cannot.   It was a real pain to setup originally.   I've always been a Cisco man and configuring a Cisco switch is a lot different than configuring an HPE switch.   Lot of new info to learn and little bits of sleep, but we're slowing down now.   Slowly getting there.   I'd say the main contract, I wouldn't have it if it wasn't for some connections I have to have either worked at the company or currently working at the company.   Kinda got lucky there.

One thing, it seems, people keep forgetting, our servers.   We had two options.   3-phase, or 1-phase 240VAC.   I think it was Mr. Crowley who pointed out that PDUs only push out what they're fed in.   You feed them 240VAC split-phase, they put out 240VAC split-phase.   You feed them 240VAC 1-phase, they put out 240VAC 1-phase.    So I'm wondering how the people who keep recommending the 120VAC - 0 - 120VAC solutions have come up with a way of powering the servers.   I think we'd be back to an unsafe environment to the same unsafe environment we'd be in now if we ran 120VAC and 120VAC to our PDU.

[Spork Schivago]

I stand corrected.   These power supplies are the only option for our servers.   There are no three-phase ones like I was thinking.   They only make the 1400 watt in one style that's compatible with our servers.

[Richard Crowley]

Note that "120VAC - 0 - 120VAC" is the same thing as "split-phase".

None of the HPE PDU are designed to handle split-phase.  They are all designed for schemes where Neutral = Ground.

If you connect any of those HPE PDU things to domestic split-phase where Neutral = 120VAC, you are setting up a situation that is dangerous for both equipment and people.

That is why a transformer is need to convert 120-0-120 ("split-phase")  into 240-0 ("single-phase")

[Bratster]

Looks like you like to ignore simple facts.

In the USA the standard electrical outlet is 110-120 volts 60hz.

All 220-240 volt stuff uses different connectors. Because of the difference people take more care.

Think of how many people in the USA have used computer power cords. For the USA the end that connects to a computer is 115volts. For a lot of the world that is 220volts but not in USA.

So now you have people seeing the computer end thinking 115volts and connecting an extension cord to your PDU, but that is not 115 volts. A part of safe is knowing what to expect.
So what is a safe European standard is not as safe in the USA due to common thought.

The added transformer is creating a safe NON-USA standard in addition to wasting power. That transformer will get hot, and that is a waste of power. 

One thing you might like to know is that 220 volt 60hz is more dangerous then 220 volt 50hz. The 60hz has a greater chance of messing up your heart beat then 50hz.

If you want real safe 220 volts using a USA split phase( 220 Volts with a neutral center tap) you use a four wire connection. The forth connection the safety ground.
Unlike the rest of the world USA 220 volt equipment often has some 115 volt loads.

C

We need 240VAC, again, for the server, not 220VAC, although it would run on 220VAC.   Most of our equipment is NOT from the USA.   The cords to power these devices are NOT what you find with a NORMAL USA bought PC, so I highly doubt anyone who is allowed to be around the rack will try plugging anything into the PDU.    I mean, simple fact, strangers aren't going to be down here, and if they are, they're breaking the law.   Eventually, we have to worry about my daughter, but that's a long ways away, and even then, she cannot physically get into the rack to plug anything into the PDU.   Ohm's law shows us if we double the volts, we cut the current draw in half.   200v * 2 amp = 400 watts.   20 amp * 20v = 400 watts.    I think I'd rather get shocked, if I had to get shocked, at the 200v, 2 amp, rather than the 20 amp.

I have no idea how anyone is going to plug any cords into the PDU, I don't know what you think the inputs look like, but you physically cannot take a normal PC cord and plug it into the PDU.   You need special cords....most of our energy hungry equipment is designed to run off 240VAC, but most of it can go down to 100VAC.   I mean, we have some American made workstations, but they're not going into the rack at all, and aren't being powered by this PDU.   A lot of stuff came from Germany.   There's usually no switch on these pieces of equipment to flip.   They say 100VAC - 240VAC.

I mentioned in a previous post that security was our responsibility and we get audited, where some people from some companies come in and check to make sure everything is up to their standard.   We get a report on what needs to change, if anything, and it's our responsibility to change what they list.   Once we wire up the 15kVA transformer (or higher someone to wire it up for us), we'll have to have yet another one of those pesky audits.

There's security in place.  Maybe you can take comfort in knowing that currently, no one who is specifically supposed allowed in the datacenter can get into the datacenter without doing a lot of illegal work?   This isn't a playroom.   The idea is though, we do our own thing once these contracts are up, and hopefully, later on in life, our daughter takes interest.   If not, that's okay, we'll love and accept her no matter what.   That's years down the road before we burn that bridge though.

Heck, do you know how hard it was to say no to the three phase installation?   We were talking over 50,000$ and almost went for it, because then we can purchase stuff that's a bit more suited to our task at hand.   I feel better having a PDU hooked up with a backup sitting on the shelf in case one shits the bed, rather than daisy chaining a whole bunch to try and get my systems running.

220 230 and 240 volts are all the same.
Voltage wise all of those are acceptable. *

Same thing with 110 115 and 120, all of them acceptable.

In the US the nominal is 120 and 240, but it's quite common for people to say 110 and 220 Etc.

I'm not familiar with the UK at all, but I think their nominal voltage is 230 volts? But the specification allows anywhere from 220 to 240 or something like that.

*Except in some special cases, mainly on large equipment that has its own transformer built-in, then there are multiple Taps to get the voltage just right.



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[Bratster]

IMHO while I think you could install this with minimal problems you really should get an electrical engineer or commercial electrician that is familiar with something along these lines to have a plan drawn up and run it past your electrical inspector for the city and make sure everything will be okay.

You seem very concerned with security and Audits and having it done as right as it can be and all of that stuff;
 so having this planned out by a professional and approved by the inspector before you start doing things would be highly important. IMO

I would bet your insurance is going to absolutely require that.



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[Bratster]

Here is a really crappy back of the napkin bare basic sketch of what you need and has already been suggested by one or two other people in here.

It is missing probably a circuit breaker on the output of the Transformer and is not detailed, but that shows you how the Transformer would get wired up.

Your house power comes in on the left with two 120volt lines that have 240 volts between them, off of a 2 gang breaker, that feeds the Transformer.

The output of the Transformer is now its own isolated power source, so you are now able to call one side of it line at 240 volts and the other side of it neutral at 0 volts and can add a neutral to ground bond in a new breaker panel.


WARNING:
I'm not a professional engineer, I have no certifications, I have warned you to get a professional, this drawing may kill you and burn your house down.



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[Teledog]

At the risk of p*ssing some people off,
Kitchen outlets/receptacles, if done to most American codes, have alternating hot lines, above & below on each outlet (hence the center breakaway tab on the receptacle line connections)
No, this wont run a full 32 amps (do you really require that much current?)
Want easy? One can purchase these units for North American 220 (240?);
https://www.quick220.com
I've made my own ..for an Australian wired vertical donair rotisserie - works very well! 
Do not use/connect the neutral(s), just use the two hots (upper and lower receptacle)- one to each side of the 220/240 box outlet, and the ground(s), of course.
Test your outlets/receptacles with a meter before trying! Not every electrician follows code.
Perhaps do the same technique with higher UL current rated connections?
G'luck!

[Richard Crowley]

Kitchen outlets/receptacles, if done to most American codes, have alternating hot lines, above & below on each outlet (hence the center breakaway tab on the receptacle line connections)

Can you cite an authoritative reference for that?
In 70 years I have never seen (or even heard of) such an extraordinary thing.

Even if it is everything as claimed, while it might be suitable for some random domestic applications, it is certainly not up to the task of operating a rack full of heavy-duty servers.  Not if reliability means anything to you.

[Gregg]

Mr. Crowley certainly has more patience than I. 
When stated that

“None of the HPE PDU are designed to handle split-phase.  They are all designed for schemes where Neutral = Ground.”

I believe He may have overlooked the P9S13A, as I previously posted, states it is for North America and Japan as it is rated for 200 -240V, uses a standard L6-30P plug (208-240V 3 pole twist lock labeled L1, L2 and Ground in the USA) and it has 2ea 2pole 20a breakers, one for each level of the PDU.  It also has the exact same receptacles as the one chosen by Spork. 
I’m not trying to rag on Mr. Crowley here, but I still think two of the P9S13A deserve more consideration especially since Spork has stated that he may expand his power requirements.  It would eliminate the need for a transformer unless his servers specifically need a grounded neutral which is very doubtful for SMPS typical server power supplies. 
Bratster’s drawing is a fine example of how to install a transformer; with the breaker panel on the output and proper breakers installed I believe it would pass any reasonable inspection.  However there are inspectors out there that kind of make up their own rules.

[Richard Crowley]

Certainly Spork would be better off with something he can connect directly to his split-phase domestic service as @Gregg observes.  It seems unfortunate that he selected that particular PDU.  The "documentation" provided by HPE leaves a great deal to the imagination from lack of useful details.

[Gregg]

Kitchen outlets/receptacles, if done to most American codes, have alternating hot lines, above & below on each outlet (hence the center breakaway tab on the receptacle line connections)

Can you cite an authoritative reference for that?
In 70 years I have never seen (or even heard of) such an extraordinary thing.

Even if it is everything as claimed, while it might be suitable for some random domestic applications, it is certainly not up to the task of operating a rack full of heavy-duty servers.  Not if reliability means anything to you.

NEC article 210.4 allows the use of two circuits to the same receptacle and even allows sharing the return.  Enclosed is s can from the 2005 NEC handbook

I suggest that Spork buy an older copy of the NEC handbook on ebay, study it and keep it for future reference.  They don't change much between editions so a 2005 (big yellow book) or a 2008 (big blue book) or a 2011 (big red book) by the NFPA National Fire Protection Association (not by anyone else) will probably suffice

[Gregg]

Here is an example of a proper PDU being installed.  Input is 480V 3ph from one of two redundant 400KVA UPS units backed up by two redundant utility services and two 2MW V16 Caterpillar generators. Output is two panels of 42 breakers and 225a 208/120V input each.  The branch wires go through small current transformers near each breaker.  There are two grounds, the green and yellow is isolated all the way back to the data center’s ground ring; the green are tied to the PDU chassis, transformer neutral and back to the UPS ground, which in turn eventually goes back to the main ground ring. 
Data centers are very complicated in order to attempt zero down time.

[C]

One thing

When you buy computer equipment in the USA and it states that is it 220-240 Volt. There is a good chance that it is built for the USA standards.
With most businesses having 220-240 split phase power, would be a huge loss of sales not to support this.

Very easy for a computer company to make a computer power supply that works with standard 220-240 split phase power source.

C

[Monkeh]

One thing

When you buy computer equipment in the USA and it states that is it 220-240 Volt. There is a good chance that it is built for the USA standards.
With most businesses having 220-240 split phase power, would be a huge loss of sales not to support this.

Very easy for a computer company to make a computer power supply that works with standard 220-240 split phase power source.

C

End devices like that generally do not care anyway.

None of my power supplies would have the slightest problem running on split phase nor be a danger.

[Richard Crowley]

End devices like that generally do not care anyway.
None of my power supplies would have the slightest problem running on split phase nor be a danger.

Yes that is all true.  But the issue here is the power controller/strip "PDU" , not the destination loads (which probably don't care as you say).

If the PDU controls/switches/protects only the "Line" (hot) side and you connect the "Neutral" (low) side to 120V (because of using 120-0-120 "split-phase") then you have live, active 120V on the "Neutral" side of all the outlets even when the PDU is supposed to be switched off (or has tripped the breaker because of a fault).
And if the fault was on the "Neutral" side, it may have no protection at all because it was designed with the assumption the Neutral = Ground.

"Split-phase" 120-0-120 is a bastard scheme if you need 240V for any kind of proper industrial gear (including these HPE PDU things)
Industrial gear is designed for proper single-phase (240-0)

[Monkeh]

End devices like that generally do not care anyway.
None of my power supplies would have the slightest problem running on split phase nor be a danger.

Yes that is all true.  But the issue here is the power controller/strip "PDU" , not the destination loads (which probably don't care as you say).

I'm well aware, and in fact have been in this thread making these points..

[C]

"Split-phase" 120-0-120 is a bastard scheme if you need 240V for any kind of proper industrial gear (including these HPE PDU things)
Industrial gear is designed for proper single-phase (240-0)

Actually Split-phase can be safer.

First you have GFCI or RCD to think about.
To reduce EMI or RFI X-cap's or Y-cap's are used. With two wire power and one side Neutral you are connecting 1/2 AC voltage to somethiing, the Neutral lead or safety ground. To work around this the GFCI or RCD has to be made less sensitive. With the center Neutral you have 0 volt AC EMI/RFI connected to Neutral so a more sensitive GFCI/RCD is possible..

There is no perfect wire so there is always a voltage drop on the Neutral lead making it NOT ground. A short from Neutral to something is connecting the voltage drop to something and not detected with fuse or circuit breaker in the hot lead. With split-phase this is detected. Shorts like this do happen and can have many watts of power turned in to heat.

Then you have 1/2 voltage difference to actual ground, again safer

The big cost is often just the one added wire and dual breakers.

Equipment designed for split-phase can be designed three ways.

1. You have Equipment that needs some 110-120 for internal use in addition to 220-240. Here three wire or safer 4 wire connection.

2. like above but with no 110-120 internal use so that the Neutral lead supplies no power.

3. A variation of #2 is Two hots and where Neutral lead is just used for a safety ground.

Three phase is just a shift to three hots vs two hots.

C

[Richard Crowley]

Actually Split-phase can be safer.

Yes, that all may be true, but none of it is beneficial (or even relevant) to the specific case at hand.
Bottom line: The PDU appears to be designed to have Neutral = ground and connecting split-phase to it is dangerous.