Just moved into old house and want to wire up drier.?

Question

The house we just moved into is from the 50's. The old drier is wired direct to the panel....white, green, red and black wires at the drier. The plug from the new drier has a half moon at top, two verticals on the sides and one L shape at the bottom. The outlet that I bought tells me where the white and green go, but the other connections are marked x and y. Can anybody give any help with this? Also, is there anything i should be looking for in particular at the panel? Thanks.

Answer 1

I am not an electrician.  But green is earth ground, white is neutral, the other 2 wires are both hot.  So it probably does not matter which red or black goes to x or y.

Basically there are 3 wires into your home.  Between either of the 2 hot wires and neutral (white) is ~120 VAC.  Between the 2 hot wires there is ~240 VAC.

PS: Make sure there is NO voltage on those wires before touching them.  Do you know how to use a volt meter?

Answer 2

First the old drier was wired up with the wrong Color code so ignore it and remove that wire all together.

Now you can get away with 10 Gage wire if your dryer is less than  20 feet from the box, but for safety use most electrical codes require a four-wire 8 Gage cable up to the outlet. and a 4 wire 10 guage stranded dryer cable from the outlet to the dryer.

Ask for 8-3 NM-B cable W/G (8-Gage wire, three conductors, with ground)

Here even Home Depot can help you get the right wire.

Red and Black are the hots

White is neutral (the L shaped spade)

Green is ground (The rounded bottom spade)

tcw

Answer 3

Here's an article with pictures that tells you how to wire in a new outlet and a new dryer power cord.  If the wire is 10-3 w/gnd you shouldn't have to change anything there, just mount a new outlet at the end of it as it sounds like you have the incorrect outlet there now.  Then, buy a standard dryer cord and connect it as shown in the article and you should be good to go.  Be sure to turn off the double breaker to the dryer before working on it.

http://fixitnow.com/2004/08/appliance-re...