I was recently given what I think is a Rossi CC45. It's 220V (my friend tested it on 220 before he gave it to me). Anyway, I don't have any spare 220 in my coffee area and I don't want to run any wire, so I was thinking it might be possible to run the grinder on a transformer. Now I'm sure if this was a european grinder that would work fine, but I'm not so sure with one that's set up for North America since we have split phase 220V. Can anyone confirm that NA wired grinders will work with a step up transformer (110V to 120V)?

I expect it would work.
Do you have a picture of the plate with electrical specifications on the grinder?

I had a 220Vac Mazzer SJ a while back. I bought thinking that it was a 110. The seller had rewired the it with a 110 power cord...
Anyway, I bought a 1500W stepup transformer and it worked perfectly.

No badging of any kind on this grinder. Pretty sure its 220v 60hz and under 200w since it has rossi style stepped adjustment and all the rossis are low watt.

darilon wrote:I... Now I'm sure if this was a european grinder that would work fine, but I'm not so sure with one that's set up for North America since we have split phase 220V. Can anyone confirm that NA wired grinders will work with a step up transformer (110V to 120V)?

Just a couple of electrical notes. The North American standard is 240 volts at 60Hz A/C single phase. The 240 volt side of the power utility's step-down transformer is center tapped so that from center to either side is 120 volts. Technically, these are "legs" not phases.

So, I think your question of a step up transformer from 110 to 120 was probably a typo.

As others have already answered, stepping up from 120 to 240 is easy, just get a transformer capable of the load your bringer presents.

However, the other factor is the A/C frequency. Depending on a number of factors, it is possible that when you run a european grinder on 60Hz it will run 20% faster than it would on 50Hz.

Berkinet: you are correct about the typo. 110 to 220 (or 120 to 240 depending of course on what line voltage you have at the wall socket).

Where I need the clarification is that given that this is a North American market grinder designed for 220-240V 60hz, which would normally be provided by one 120V hot and another 120V hot 180 degrees out of phase, would it work with a step transformer that I assume would be providing 240V by doubling the hot voltage (halving amps) and providing a neutral. I guess one way to look at it is: can a European grinder run on NA 240V and can a NA grinder run on European 240V?

I think you may be over analyzing this...

With NA 240 volt wiring, there is only one phase. So, if you connect a meter across the two sides of your incoming line you have 240. Or, from either side to ground/neutral you have 120. If you take a 120 to 240 volt transformer and plug it into your regular wall outlet, the output will be 240 volts. You won't have, or need a neutral on the 240 volt side.

If you can run 240 to your grinder, that is the best way to go. Note, you may already have 240 available if there are circuits from both legs in a box.

Thanks for the clarification. I've only worked enough with 240v to be able to rewire new baseboard heaters in after a renovation so I really don't have a strong working understanding of how it works. I thought I'd remembered there being 0V difference between the two legs when I put the multimeter on them, but I could be remembering that incorrectly. Glad I can go ahead and get a transformer so I can start messing around with this new grinder. It may not get better than my Mini even after modding, but that won't stop me from trying. I mean it *does* have 64mm burrs after all, and if I can get the slop out of the upper burr carrier threads and convert to step-less....

The nearest 240v is at the dryer and my wife says I'm not allowed to mess with it.

edit: I found a nice document that explains why you are right:
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=& ... 8874,d.aWM

FWIW, I found this diagram at http://www.electrical-contractor.net/fo ... rmers.html