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Cold weather started early this year and I decided to turn the heater on. However after a couple hours the heater has finally kicked the bucket after some odd 25 years. I checked the voltage and wattage on the existing heater so I could swap it out. Ran to the store grabbed a baseboard heater of same watt/voltage.

When I opened this heater up its asking me to connect the neutral wire onto the thermostat on the baseboard, however I only have the red/black wires and neither are marked as neutral. Can I test the wires to see if one is in fact a neutral wire, or are they likely a load/line setup? It is a 240v 2000w Dimplex LPC with the onboard thermostat. Thanks for any advice! Just trying to get warm.

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  • In the USA you should be connecting to L1 & L2,, which would usually be black & red. You would only connect to Neutral (white) if you were in a country where 240V single-phase is the standard electrical supply to homes.
    – brhans
    Commented Sep 26, 2016 at 22:12
  • Thank you very much for the response! I am in Canada and everything else is in the house is setup black & red. Am I looking at the diagram incorrectly? It specifies a neutral, L1 & L2. dimplex.com/cms/publications/7211700100R02_EN.pdf
    – user3555200
    Commented Sep 26, 2016 at 22:28
  • Can you get us a closeup photo of the control board? It seems that the neutral is needed for the control board...but that might be workaround-able
    – ThreePhaseEel
    Commented Sep 27, 2016 at 1:12
  • Thanks in advance! Its kind of tricky since it has the plate in front but if you need another from a different angle that can be done! postimg.org/image/ii30fsqoj
    – user3555200
    Commented Sep 27, 2016 at 10:23

2 Answers 2

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Judging by the diagram (Fig.2) at the bottom of the 1st page on the install instructions you've linked, you should be connecting your Black L1 to the baseboard's Black, Your Red L2 to the Baseboard's Blue, and your ground to the Baseboard's Ground screw.
This baseboard heater doesn't require a Neutral for a North-American split-phase 240V supply.
You only need Live/Neutral if you have European single-phase 240V.

There's a slightly clearer version of the instructions here, with this diagram on page 2: enter image description here

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  • Thank you so much!! This page wasn't included with the heater, and I never thought to look further when looking at the PDF. I greatly appreciate you taking time out of your day to assist!
    – user3555200
    Commented Sep 27, 2016 at 20:48
  • Followed instructions and it worked like a charm! Because its a digital thermostat on the baseboard heater I had to bypass the analog one on the wall. I simple removed the thermostat and connected all 3 black wires together. Hope this wasn't wrong...
    – user3555200
    Commented Sep 28, 2016 at 1:59
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Most older baseboards do not have a neutral run to the baseboard. The 240V your heater needs is supplied by L1 & L2 the voltage across the 2 wires is 240V. if you had a neutral you would be able to measure 120V from each of the wires to the neutral. The neutral is probably needed for A newer solid state thermostat that operates on 120V.

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