Previous owner installed a 220v wire box outside of Garage for Hot tub. It is run through the Garage panel inside to out. Just the wires not outlet.

I want to install a 3 wire outlet so I can plug in my 220v welder. Why to I have an extra wire.. One red I assume is hot, one white I assume is neutral, One black > hot.. and finally a bare unshielded wire I assume must be ground.. I really haate to assume when it comes to 220v 50 amp.:confused:

Hello,

I am attempting to install a 3 wire 220v Outlet for my Welder to an existing 220v electrical box on my Garage that was apparently used for a Hot Tub at one time. The box is outside of Garage. What is confusing to me is there are wires going to the box from the inside breaker panel, and wires coming from the ground going to the outside electrical box also.. Why 2 sets of wires..

I believe I should use the Red & black as hot, and the bare as a ground. What should I do with the white wire..

Thanks in advance... Joe:confused:

You are right in thinking that the RED and the BLACK are the two hot lines and the WHITE is neutral and the bare copper wire is the ground. Make sure you take this ground all the way to the metal on the pump housing.

If you have a volt meter you can go out to the breaker box and double check the wires at the breaker.

The lower wires probably went to the hot tub a few feet away by way of an underground conduit.

Other issues:

The panel may not be made for outside use.
Since this is a 3 wire fed sub-panel, ground and neutral should remain separate. They don't appear to be. Usually you need a ground lug kit to make that happen and a green ground bond screw should be removed.

Your welder doesn't need the white wire. If those wires at the bottom were running to "the welder", then the white could be capped.

There was proobably a two pole GFCI breaker there which requires a neutral connection, so all the wires at the bottom went to the spa breaker.

The issue I see, although wires are obscuring the lower section is that the neutral (white) from the top/feed is not isolated.

OK, I feel really dumb now.. Thanks

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