3 prong 50 amp plug to 4 prong 50 amp ????

Rick Jay wrote:
GlennLever,

What you say is correct, and it will work. The danger is two-fold.

First, the neutral conductors are not designed to be current carrying and are oftentimes a smaller wire than the current carrying conductors. So you run the risk of overloading that wire and potentially causing overheating/fire.

Second is you raised the ground wire to a non-ground potential between that receptacle you wired and the main breaker box. This applies to every ground in that branch circuit, effectively creating a shock hazard for any appliance which uses the ground on that branch.

Will it work? Yes. But there are very good reasons why it shouldn't be done.


msmith1199, appliances which need 120V AND 240V (such as electric ranges, 50A motorhomes, hot-tubs, etc.) use the 4-wire as they need the neutral conductor to split the 240V potential (into 2 120V lines) and then use this wire as a return to the breaker box for any imbalance of current between the two hots. Appliances which use ONLY 240V (baseboard electric heaters, hot water heaters, welders, etc.) can use a 3-wire circuit as the device current will only travel on the 2 hot wires. For any convention, the GROUND wire should NEVER be used to carry current as part of normal operation.

A 50A RV plug is the exact same as used on a modern electric range, and I believe electric dryers and hot tubs as well. It is NOT unique to RV's.

~Rick

Rick you have no idea what your talking about. infact the neutral is a current carrying conductor. Where do the electrons flow, once they have passed through the resistor? back to ground on the neutral. current flow in a GFCI device is measured on a neutral. Neutrals connot be undersised, the grounded conductor must be the same size as the ungrounded conductor. There is one instance where there will be no current flow on a neutral. On a three wire branch circuit ot feeder if the current is exactly the same on both ungrounded conductors,or a perfectly balanced situation, there will be no current flow on the neutral