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The Mysteries of Dryer Cord Wiring

These two pics show how to wire dryer cords. The one to the right here is the old-style 3-wire configuration. Most people have this type in their homes. New code changes, though, require that dryers now have a 4-wire cord, shown below.

Besides the number of wires in each cord, there are two important things to notice. First, in the 4-wire configuration, notice that the dryer's grounding strap is folded back on itself--the whole point of the 4-wire cord is to separate the ground from the neutral. In the 3-wire configuration, the grounding strap is left intact--neutral and ground are tied together.

Also, on the 4-wire configuration the green wire (the "new" extra wire in the 4-wire cord) is attached to the dryer cabinet.

These two pictures show the difference between the 3 prong and 4 prong dryer outlets:

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