# Hair dryers



## chris.b (Jan 28, 2013)

Had a call to a beauty salon. Lady said that 2 other electricians have been there and they could not figure out the problem. Hair dryers were burning out every 3 or 4 months at different stations. It is a 120/208 3 phase system. 2/0 copper for all SE wires except the ground was a #4. Meter with no disconnect was about 100 feet from panel. 124V, 124V, 123V to neutral. Each station has its own circuit. But, 3 circuits share a neutral, 2 others share a neutral and 2 others share a neutral. It is random that the hair dryers stop working. No station seems to be worse than another. #12 solid ran to each station. Voltage is not less than 118v on any circuit at the station when dryer is on. Turned multiple dryers on and voltages and amp draw are no more than 14 on line and neutral when multiple dryers are used. 

What is happening? I thought it had to be a neutral problem but can't find it. No VD to worry about. POCO has checked their connection, (while I was not there) and said all of their connections are good.

Any ideas?


----------



## sparkie2010 (Sep 15, 2009)

I wonder if the lights dim when the Ac goes on, or possible a surge when the Ac kick off?

Or maybe it's cheap oversea defects?


----------



## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

chris.b said:


> Had a call to a beauty salon. Lady said that 2 other electricians have been there and they could not figure out the problem. Hair dryers were burning out every 3 or 4 months at different stations. It is a 120/208 3 phase system. 2/0 copper for all SE wires except the ground was a #4. Meter with no disconnect was about 100 feet from panel. 124V, 124V, 123V to neutral. Each station has its own circuit. But, 3 circuits share a neutral, 2 others share a neutral and 2 others share a neutral. It is random that the hair dryers stop working. No station seems to be worse than another. #12 solid ran to each station. Voltage is not less than 118v on any circuit at the station when dryer is on. Turned multiple dryers on and voltages and amp draw are no more than 14 on line and neutral when multiple dryers are used.
> 
> What is happening? I thought it had to be a neutral problem but can't find it. No VD to worry about. POCO has checked their connection, (while I was not there) and said all of their connections are good.
> 
> Any ideas?


Well for your situation what I done in the Beauty salon is never run any MWBC espcally where the hair dryers will be located that something I will always advoid it much as possible.

Second thing did you ever get a chance to amp clamp the main service entrance to see how much current you are running that do included the netural conductor.

Those hair dryers are pretty hard on system if not carefull and keep in your mind many hair dryer in commercal evroment is hard on them and they don't last long as homeowner grade due they run it very often and they don't let them cool off pretty fast. 

And look at the receptales very carefull for looseness and I am not talking about the conductor itself the key issue is the blade insterst they should be pretty good and snug not like little loose.

Make sure you get a very good commercal or industail grade receptale not the homeowner grade type.

but what the deal with 2/0 AWG for service entrance is that place have 200 amp service or what ?

Merci,
Marc


----------



## Deep Cover (Dec 8, 2012)

Has anything else burnt up?

Did you trace the circuit and check all the connections...especially the neutral?


----------



## westom (Nov 12, 2011)

chris.b said:


> Each station has its own circuit. But, 3 circuits share a neutral, 2 others share a neutral and 2 others share a neutral.


 Reactive loads sharing a common neutral means that neutral wire must be larger than required by code.

This and similar problems can be discovered using an incandescent bulb. If the neutral wire is insufficient, then bulbs should dim as appliances power cycle. No intensity change implies problems elsewhere.


----------



## BBQ (Nov 16, 2010)

westom said:


> Reactive loads sharing a common neutral means that neutral wire must be larger than required by code.


Hair dryers are primarily resistive loads, they do not require a larger neutral.


----------



## xlink (Mar 12, 2012)

Are all the hair dryers the same make? Maybe the problem is the hair dryers.


----------



## BBQ (Nov 16, 2010)

xlink said:


> Are all the hair dryers the same make? Maybe the problem is the hair dryers.


I have been thinking kind of the same thing.

Are they buying Walmart household hair dryers and using them all day long in a business? I would not expect them to last long.


----------



## wendon (Sep 27, 2010)

What's "burning out" on the hair dryers? The motors, the heaters, or the thermal fuse? I'd try to get my hands on one of them and disassemble it to see if you can figure out what is failing. If it's the thermal fuse they might be getting plugged with hair and other matter.


----------



## westom (Nov 12, 2011)

BBQ said:


> Hair dryers are primarily resistive loads, they do not require a larger neutral.


 Then the light bulb will not be reporting that or other problems. If wiring is OK, then their incandescent bulb is not changing intensity. A simple test that any layman can perform. To then move on to other suspects.


----------



## chris.b (Jan 28, 2013)

All receptacles were replaced by the 2nd electrician about 8 months ago. And are all 20 amp receptacles. AC causes nothing to change. 

MC cable used on only 2 stations and are ran all the way to panel.

No discoloration at either end of any neutral. Not that I took EVERY one out. But the most amp draw was 14 amps on neutral with multiple dryers going.

Most of the dryers are expensive ones. And I don't know what burnt up means for all of them. Some would work on high but not low. One would not come on at all, but she took it home and it worked there. (Not real sure about that one.)

I had thought that the neutral should have been bigger, before I went on the call, thinking about multiwire branch circuit, but didn't find anything to prove me right.


----------



## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

If you can't really find anything after you check all the items and pass with flying colours then the next step is use the recording data to read the current / voltage to see where it went so you can able spot hidden surge or dips.

How those breakers are ? warm or cool or cooking hot ?

let us know what is your next move on this one.

Merci,
Marc


----------



## Shockdoc (Mar 4, 2010)

Cheap personal grade Chinese blow dryers. I deal with a couple body shops, they burn out buffers every 6 mos. The more use, the less life.


----------



## noarcflash (Sep 14, 2011)

Simple problem. They are residential grade blow dryers, not commercial grade. Professional blow dryers are meant for severe usage, with heavier cords, and beefy strain reliefs.


----------



## bobelectric (Feb 24, 2007)

Too much fluff and hair on air intakes


----------



## Wirenuting (Sep 12, 2010)

Is this salon the type were they "Lease" chairs to the beauticians?
If so and if you found no electrical problems then the burn out is due to "Cheap" hair dryers. 
Most kitchen beauticians and those who are working on a small budget have a habit of buying cheap equipment. The home owner grade just don't cut the constant usage. 
Same goes for the clippers, they can't hold up. My wife was a beautician and her clippers are the type were you can swap the brushes on the motor just like we did with the older power tools years ago. 

Remember that we here on ET laugh at the cheap tools that new electricians buy, they don't hold out.


----------



## uconduit (Jun 6, 2012)

I would imagine that hair dryers have a power factor of nearly 100%. I mean a little fan blowing air out doesn't account for much of the 15 amps or so that hair dryers use.


----------



## gnuuser (Jan 13, 2013)

if you could find out exactly what parts are burning out in the driers,
this may give you a getter understanding of whats going on with them.
also remember in a beauty salon the equipment is subject to a lot of chemical exposure.
fumes from these chemicals can accelerate corrosion and cause early failure.


----------



## Spunk#7 (Nov 30, 2012)

I bet the "Cootie Catcher" is clogging up. Maybe a can of bug spray would help ?


----------



## manchestersparky (Mar 25, 2007)

Hey Chris did you solve the problem or walk away from it ????

Don't leave us hanging


----------



## chris.b (Jan 28, 2013)

I installed a surge protector. So far I have not heard anything else out of it, but I am not sure that I won't. 

This is a franchise salon and all the stylists are supposed to have quality equipment, but that doesn't mean that they do. One of the stylists said that his dryer was expensive, actually said the name but I can't remember it. 

Time will tell.


----------



## papaotis (Jun 8, 2013)

could be the hair spray, hair, etc. in a multi-station salon. ive seen several home 'fart-fans' slow or stopped from being gummed up by hair spray


----------



## Ionspot (Aug 9, 2013)

papaotis said:


> could be the hair spray, hair, etc. in a multi-station salon. ive seen several home 'fart-fans' slow or stopped from being gummed up by hair spray



Hair spray on the screen/filters would make them into oil impregnated air filters. :detective:


----------



## chris.b (Jan 28, 2013)

Got a call from this salon again. It has happened a few times since the surge protector was installed. They called yet another electrician that the new owner uses and he could not find anything either. I told them that the all that I knew to do was to pull neutrals with each circuit instead of them sharing a neutral.

Any other takers?


----------



## RIVETER (Sep 26, 2009)

Shockdoc said:


> Cheap personal grade Chinese blow dryers. I deal with a couple body shops, they burn out buffers every 6 mos. The more use, the less life.


If they don't use Chi Pro they aren't professionals.


----------



## A Little Short (Nov 11, 2010)

chris.b said:


> Got a call from this salon again. It has happened a few times since the surge protector was installed. They called yet another electrician that the new owner uses and he could not find anything either. I told them that the all that I knew to do was to pull neutrals with each circuit instead of them sharing a neutral.
> 
> Any other takers?


I don't think you have a neutral overloading/overheating problem or you would find evidence of that by looking at the neutrals in the panel and in the receptacles.

You could however have a neutral problem at the panel or POCO connection. If there is a problem there you could very well be burning up equipment depending on what loads are on with anything that is being damaged.

But this should show up way sooner than months apart. I would check the panel and meter connections just to be sure.
But it sounds like you are going to have to put some kind of logger on to see if spikes, dips, surges, etc are happening.

I would also do as was suggested earlier, take apart one of the dryers to see what is failing in them. You might have a bunch of "disgruntled" hairdressers that are trying to get the owner to buy them new equipment!


----------



## westom (Nov 12, 2011)

chris.b said:


> Got a call from this salon again. It has happened a few times since the surge protector was installed.


Why is anyone discussing a solution when the problem has not yet been defined. If neutral wires were the problem, then the incandescent lamp test would have easily identified it. The more professional solution to learn same is a data logger. So why did anyone make any changes without first identifying the defect?

If hairdryers are damaged by low voltage (ie overloaded neutral), then why did anyone install surge protectors? Surge protectors do absolutely nothing until 120 volts well exceeds 330 volts. And again, the incandescent bulb would have identified the defect.

Even overloading that would not be apparent on wire inspection can be obvious using a light bulb or data logger.

Long before curing anything, first define the problem. Otherwise all those attempts (surge protector, 20 amp receptacles, etc) are no different than spitting in the wind.


----------



## Spark Master (Jul 3, 2012)

Order 220v hair dryers from Europe, and install a 250volt outlet at each counter. The dryers will work great on 208 volts. Cut off the European plugs, and install American 250volt plugs.

The current draw will drop in half, even less. No neutrals to worry about. Less heat in each circuit.


----------



## Meadow (Jan 14, 2011)

chris.b said:


> Got a call from this salon again. It has happened a few times since the surge protector was installed. They called yet another electrician that the new owner uses and he could not find anything either. I told them that the all that I knew to do was to pull neutrals with each circuit instead of them sharing a neutral.
> 
> Any other takers?


Tell them to use these:

http://www.solanopower.com/products/Pages/ProductDetails.aspx?CategoryID=Dryers&ProductID=SO091005


I am willing to bet a lot of money its not the electrical system but quality of dryer being used. Consumer grade dryers and professional salon grade dryers are different animals. For one most consumer grade dryers use 12 volt toy motors vs 120 volt universal motors. Heaters, switches, ect are beefed up. 

Post a pic of the dryers failing and that will answer everything.


----------



## LGLS (Nov 10, 2007)

Spark Master said:


> Order 220v hair dryers from Europe, and install a 250volt outlet at each counter. The dryers will work great on 208 volts. Cut off the European plugs, and install American 250volt plugs.
> 
> The current draw will drop in half, even less. No neutrals to worry about. Less heat in each circuit.


Another reason to use European (England, Ireland, German) appliances- their consumer protection agencies are a LOT stricter and don't allow junk that breaks when dropped, or burns out after repeated usage to be sold at all. 

BTW if it was a neutral problem why just the hair dryers being affected? You would think if a loose neutral was causing periodic overvoltages that the hair stylists would know better to turn the damn thing off when it goes into launch-a-space-shuttle mode, no?


----------



## Bogart (Jul 20, 2015)

Putting a Power monitoring device on the system for a few days or even a week is advisable....however if you do not have access to that...the next best thing to determine if it is a problem with the supplying electric and not the equipment is install a UPS with Automatic Voltage Correction at each station that is having the problem and see if the problem continues.

The UPS will correct any voltage imperfections, unlike a surge protector and if it is an electrical problem, they will not be replacing anymore Hair dryers....if it is a equipment problem..well then they will be replacing them regardless.


----------



## JohnJ65 (May 8, 2008)

My wife has bought the highest quality hair dryer she can get and they still never make it past a year of use. Even the ones that claim they are made in Europe. 

So assuming we are talking hand held and not the sit down type, my bet is that they just don't make em like they used to.


----------



## Bad Electrician (May 20, 2014)

Bogart said:


> Putting a Power monitoring device on the system for a few days or even a week is advisable....however if you do not have access to that...the next best thing to determine if it is a problem with the supplying electric and not the equipment is install a UPS with Automatic Voltage Correction at each station that is having the problem and see if the problem continues.
> 
> The UPS will correct any voltage imperfections, unlike a surge protector and if it is an electrical problem, they will not be replacing anymore Hair dryers....if it is a equipment problem..well then they will be replacing them regardless.


 
And even a cheap UPS has some level of monitoring; UV, LV typically, connect it to a laptop and monitor.


----------



## Spark Master (Jul 3, 2012)

1500 watt hair dryer will not work on a low level UPS.


----------



## Bad Electrician (May 20, 2014)

Spark Master said:


> 1500 watt hair dryer will not work on a low level UPS.


I

You DO NOT plug into the UPS you plug the UPS into the same circuit as the hair dryer. STRICTLY FOR MONITORING PURPOSES.


----------



## Meadow (Jan 14, 2011)

JohnJ65 said:


> My wife has bought the highest quality hair dryer she can get and they still never make it past a year of use. Even the ones that claim they are made in Europe.
> 
> So assuming we are talking hand held and not the sit down type, my bet is that they just don't make em like they used to.



Tell her to try these:

http://www.solanopower.com/products/Pages/ProductDetails.aspx?CategoryID=Dryers&ProductID=SO091005


----------



## Bogart (Jul 20, 2015)

Bad Electrician said:


> I
> 
> You DO NOT plug into the UPS you plug the UPS into the same circuit as the hair dryer. STRICTLY FOR MONITORING PURPOSES.


http://www.apc.com/products/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=SMT2200&total_watts=1600

All depends on how big of a UPS you get


----------



## Bad Electrician (May 20, 2014)

Bogart said:


> http://www.apc.com/products/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=SMT2200&total_watts=1600
> 
> All depends on how big of a UPS you get


I have worked around UPS systems since the 70's when a 30 was 12' long without batteries. Seen em from 300 watts to megawatts and multi-UPS systems.

But running a hard dryer off a UPS is not practical for a variety of reasons. There is an issue going on and the electricians on site have not found this issue. 

I would have handled the situation different, but unless they want to pay......


----------



## Bogart (Jul 20, 2015)

Never said it was practical....in my original response I did mention he needed to ideally hook up a power monitoring meter to the system to see if it is the power....my bet is there is a neutral problem, but if it is intermittent, then finding it without the use of external monitoring is not going to be easy...especially in a hair salon while in use. Kitchens and hair salons are usually the worse


----------



## Bad Electrician (May 20, 2014)

Bogart said:


> *Never said it was practical*....in my original response I did mention he needed to ideally hook up a power monitoring meter to the system to see if it is the power....my bet is there is a neutral problem, but if it is intermittent, then finding it without the use of external monitoring is not going to be easy...especially in a hair salon while in use. Kitchens and hair salons are usually the worse


I understood that and I also saw your Power monitor post. My response was that a CHEAP way to get something that can monitor voltage (with limitations) is with a plug and play UPS. The right UPS will give at a minimum UV and OV. From that you can discern the problem as I suspect a neutral issue as well.

The power disturbance analyzers we utilize run from 5000.00 to 20,000.00 to buy, renting is an option with a learning curve all of which I doubt a salon would want to pay for therefore I offered him a inexpensive solution.


----------



## LGLS (Nov 10, 2007)

It's neither a power disturbance nor a bad neutral. You're dealing with hairdressers. With the exception of perhaps McDonald's employees, some of the dumbest, most ignorant and stupidest people on the planet. Absolutely nothing is going wrong with anything in the shop EXCEPT their blow driers? The lighting, the HVAC, the cash register, the curling irons all fine and dandy. Run, don't walk away from this "problem."


----------



## ponyboy (Nov 18, 2012)

This happened to me once. All gfci circuits were deemed functionally sound so they were told to get better hair driers. They did and they worked. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## Bogart (Jul 20, 2015)

IslandGuy said:


> It's neither a power disturbance nor a bad neutral. You're dealing with hairdressers. With the exception of perhaps McDonald's employees, some of the dumbest, most ignorant and stupidest people on the planet. Absolutely nothing is going wrong with anything in the shop EXCEPT their blow driers? The lighting, the HVAC, the cash register, the curling irons all fine and dandy. Run, don't walk away from this "problem."


It very well could be, but our job is not to guess, it is to fix the problem or provide a solution. 

And as for your opinion of hairdressers, well they are needed in this world, and they provide a service to which virtually all use, no need to mock their perceived intelligence because they chose that profession. Same goes for anyone working anywhere...they are working and contributing to society.


----------



## Bad Electrician (May 20, 2014)

Bogart said:


> It very well could be, but our job is not to guess, it is to fix the problem or provide a solution.
> 
> And as for your opinion of hairdressers, well they are needed in this world, and they provide a service to which virtually all use, no need to mock their perceived intelligence because they chose that profession. Same goes for anyone working anywhere...they are working and contributing to society.


:thumbsup:

Some people say the same thing about electricians


----------



## eddy current (Feb 28, 2009)

So in Canada you MUST be licensed to be a hairdresser, but you don't have to be licensed to be a carpenter. Both are Red Seal trades, but only hairdressing is mandatory.


----------



## mike9666 (Jul 28, 2015)

sorry to bring back an old post. But to check if you have a undersized neutral you plug in a incandescent bulb on the same curcuit and turn the hair dryer on and see if the bulb dims?


----------



## scrooge (Jan 26, 2008)

Loose conec at receps with split circuits.


----------

