have dip tanks that were supplied with 480. moved to new building everything was 480. new building has 208 only. having problems changing some of my wash tanks over. tanks have 12 3000 watt heaters in each tank. can change controls over but not sure how to change heaters over.

 

There would appear to be several options available to you. The most straightforward is to buy one or more 208->480 V transformers.

You might also look at just replacing the heater elements with 208V elements. However, it seems possible that you would need to replace all the wiring and fusing if you did that since the 208V circuits will require 2.3X the current.

It is hard to give you good advice on this kind of situation since you have not provided a whole lot of information upon which a decision can be made.

It is even possible that whatever configuration of heaters you have might be reconfigurable in some way that is workable for your new situation.

what are you doing with the other 480V loads?

--
Bob
http://ilbob.blogspot.com/

 

I would think the easiest (not necessarily the best) option is to step up the voltage using transformers.

I agree with Bob having a better understanding of what you are doing with other 480v loads in your facility would help.

Regards,

Matt Howe
http://bgbsupply.com
http://beyondthegraybox.com

 

You might have the possibility of changing the heater from Star to Delta.

Make a sketch of the element arrangement and post it here.

<b>Moderator's Note:</b> You will have to post the sketch somewhere else and post the url here. You cannot post attachments here.

 

Dan... Roy makes a good point! Can you provide a description of the tank heaters? For example:

1) Does each tank have a single-heater, rated 12.3kW @ 480V, or 3 heaters, each rated 4.1kW @ 480V?

2) If there are three heaters per tank, then are they Wye or Delta-Connected?

3) Are loads always balanced on each tank?

4) What is the total load with all tanks heaters energized?

Regards,
Phil Corso