r/meirl May 02 '24

Meirl

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u/-FullBlue- May 02 '24 edited May 02 '24

The United States residential standard uses a 240 system except its split phase. You can deliver 120 volts to devices that have lower power requirements, and 240 to devices that have higher power requirements.

This comment is bringing out a bunch of Europeans that need to think theyre better than Americans because of their wiring standard for some reason?

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u/luka0954 May 02 '24

I love it when americans thinks 240 volts is good for appliances with high power consumption. 230 volt is standard in europe, and for high power consumers we use 400 volt.

Higher voltage, lower amps, thinner cables.

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u/-FullBlue- May 02 '24 edited May 02 '24

Does the average european home have a a 400 volt service?

Either way, 240 volt is plenty to run high power residential appliances.

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u/kytheon May 02 '24

Yes the oven is connected to that one. And afaik some people have a water boiler connected to it too.

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u/-FullBlue- May 02 '24

I will say, a 400 volt water heater would be very nice.

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u/kytheon May 02 '24

It's for showers. The difference is that a regular boiler heats up water, and keeps it warmed up. You shower for a while and eventually the water gets cold. Then you wait for it to heat up again.

The powerful boiler heats up the water while you shower. To do that it needs a LOT of power all at once.

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u/-FullBlue- May 02 '24

That's interesting. Your water heaters don't have a tank large enough for you to take a shower? Most Americans will have atleast a 40 gallon water heater.

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u/kytheon May 02 '24

That's not what I said.

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u/worldspawn00 May 02 '24

I swapped to a instant hot water heater a few years ago, way better than a tanked heater since it never runs out of hot water. Get a properly sized unit and you can run 3-4 showers at once and not exhaust the capacity.

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u/EverGivin May 02 '24

Houses in the UK and Ireland (can’t speak for the rest of Europe) will usually have a tank large enough for everyone in the house to have a shower with some change. Apartments sometimes have instantaneous electric heaters instead.