Help

I guess I know even less about wiring than I thought.

I found a loose piece of Romex hanging down in my air handler closet. It was live. Tonight I traced it to the circuit panel and tested the voltage. I got 163 volts. I checked another breaker and got 327 volts.

Am I going crazy? I have heard of 110, 220, and 480. I have never heard of these odd new voltages. The weird thing is, it’s on the same panel as a bunch of 110 circuits.

More

Turns out I don’t know how to operate a Fluke meter. My meter does not autorange, so you have to have the correct range selected, or it tells you garbage. The actual voltages are 440 and 220.

Some doofus used #12 Romex to run a 220 circuit on a 20-amp breaker, and he left the ground wire dangling inside the panel. So you hook a three-prong receptacle up to this thing, and you think it’s grounded, and then you die, I guess.

Anyway, now I have a nice piece of Romex I can easily use to create a 220 socket in the garage. My question: is 220 with a 20-amp breaker and #12 wire useful for anything? I would think anything that runs on 220 would suck enough juice to pop that breaker.