I recently needed to work on a 240v induction range, and I don't have a 240v outlet handy, so I wired up a big
dual-primaries transformer to act as a converter. It then occurred to me that terminology can get ambiguous
here if you're not careful. I got the wrong connector at the hardware store, leaving me with a 200v 3 phase
connector on the transformer and a "240v 3 wire" connector on the "240v USA" adapter. That's the difference
between the "L14" and "L15" connectors, which are both 240VAC and look very similar but are totally
incompatible.
Some common terminology is "L-N-PE" for Live-Neutral-ProtectiveEarth (120v) and "L1-L2-PE" / L1-L2-N-PE
for 240v "split phase" as is common in the USA. (although they usually describe it as "hot" rather than "live")
Color coding is silver (metal) and white (wire) for neutral, or gold (metal) and black or red (wire) for hot(s).
Green is of course always ground. In the EU, they mark their hot brown, their neutral blue, and they add a yellow
stripe on the green ground. It's common to find this brown/blue color scheme inside accessories sold in the USA.
Keep in mind that 240v in the USA is split-phase with two hots, and in the EU 240v is a hot and a ground.
So on a "240v split-phase four-wire / neutral with ground" connector, the key on the ground pin needs to angle
toward the center of the connector. If it angles outward, that's for a "three phase" system. 3 phase is usually
noted "X-Y-Z-PE", and the phases are 120 degrees apart instead of the 180 degrees on split-phase.
It's also good to keep in mind that the hots on a split-phase are interchangeable, but swapping any two of the
three hots in a 3-phase system will reverse the "rotation" of the phases, and usually causes motors to change
direction.
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