220V Chinese Machine Hookup in Canada

Yes... but make sure the neutral inside the machine is not tied to the case ground. Have an electrician measure the resistance between the neutral on the plug and the case. Some Chinese machines come that way. It should read as an open circuit.

Is this thing certified for use in Canada? What certification marks are on it?

I don't have the machine yet but I do have an electrician who is going to look it over. Here is the inside of the machine if that helps determine if our version of 220v would work. HERE

That does not help at all.......but quite funny......

What about a proper circuit diagram?

Hi,

By looking at the photograph, it appears that the neutral (Blue wire) is not tied to the chassy. It appears that the black wire is chassy ground and the red one (Which is passing through either a fuse or ON-OFF switch) is line. Connect an ohm meter across blue and black (Neutral & ground) to see if there is continuity. If there is no continuity, you are OK to connect the red and blue across L1 & L2 and black on ground pin of your canadian plug. In any event, please have a look over it.

Job Thykkoottathil

Sloppy as all get up, but, based on the picture, it appears proper. When you get the machine, let me know about the certifications marks on it will you.

Ok, I'll let you know whats on the machine when I get it but from the pics it looks like connecting 1 hot to the red wire in the pic, one hot to the blue in the pic, ground to the black should work fine with no neutral, therefore supplying 220v across the blue and red just like 220v across the live and neutral would in their system of power?

Yes...

This is Off-topic, but I am curious as to what's the purpose of this machine?

The plug reminds me a lot of the plug that came on my Chinese manufactured Plasma Cutter....I had to hire an electrician to install the proper 220 VAC plug on the dang thing-------what a freaking nightmare!

Its a BGA rework machine for removing and reballing bad BGA chips to board on things like xboxes, laptops, and anything else that suffers from bad lead-free solder connections.

Okay many thanks for the answer!

Kinda looks like the Chinese version of a CNC machine...

Based on your picture, the main power L1 , L2 for 220 Volt operation are being switched by two solid state relays. For your safety, follow and trace these lines and see to it that none of them are connected directly to the chassis! The blue and red wires seems to be the control lines that trigger the relays to conduct, applying to the machine??

This is not the neatest constructs around. Is it just the picture, or is the insulation on the black wire off off the right hand SCR, is already cooking?

Ya... kind of looks like it doesn't it?

Well spotted.

VERY suspect......

That pic is from someone machine who's cheap transformer melted and shorted his machine and melted it, so thats why I have that guys shot. That was a pic after he fixed some of the melted wiring.

One thing I would do is to replace the power cord with one of North American standards: Black = L1, Red = L2, White = Neutral (not used) and Green = ground.

Seeing that black wire going to ground in the picture gives me a good case of the shakes.

I am NOT intimately familiar with NEC or CSA standards, but the item on the left side of the panel with two red wires looks to be a power switch. I would replace this with a double pole switch to switch the blue wires too.

I can't tell much more from the picture, but if you find any sort of fuse along the red wire, I would add a similar fuse on the blue wire. _most most MOST important of all is to make sure that the blue wire is NOT tied to ground at any point. It was said before, but it bears repeating.

Good luck

Bill

Mostly good advice, but instead of a fuse(s) or a double pole switch, may I recommend a switch action (double pole of course) but with a breaker built in that will disconnect both "lines/phases" (which were line and neutral before in original 220 volts) in the event of an over current situation.

You have to remember that in the USA (and Canada I believe) both lines when using 220 volts are "HOT", only the middle point is neutral to divide the 220 volts in two, so you don't want a fault blowing a fuse in one "line" only, but still leaving 110 volts to neutral on such a device.......too dangerous by far......you think its off, put your finger in and BOOOOM!!!

You are correct about Canada.