Electrical Techwords.

If a piece of three-phase equipment operates only on phase-to-phase voltages, it does not matter whether
the power is configured as wye or as delta. If none of the circuits in the machine or the motor being
operated derive a voltage by referencing neutral/ground, the machine does not know or care where
ground/neutral is in reference to any of the phases. It only sees the relationship between the phases. It
is evident that if you reference the three voltages of wye power and erase the connection to
ground/neutral, you have a triangle, the same as in delta configured power. Only when equipment has
single-phase 120V circuits that are derived from phase-to-neutral connections does it matter if the power
is configured as wye or delta.
If the three-phase equipment has 120V phase-to-neutral circuits that cannot be isolated and connected to
either leg 1 or leg 2, the output of the phase converter must be passed through a 240V delta to 120/208V
wye isolation transformer. This transformer will establish ground and neutral at equal distance from all
three legs and deliver the power in a wye configuration.
This is especially important when operating some newer CNC machines that have certain Fanuc or
Siemens controls. These controls handle regenerative power from the spindle motor by putting the
regenerative power back onto the line utilizing a phase-to-neutral connection on all three legs. If these
machines are powered by a phase converter with delta configured power, the regen circuit on the leg
manufactured by the phase converter will operate at a voltage that is too high. An isolation transformer
must be used to convert the power from delta to wye configuration.
An isolation transformer is commonly used to convert delta configured three-
phase power to wye-configured three-phase power.