Using GHDs in the USA (or anywhere that has 110V mains supply)

Mk 4 (Mk IV) GHDs are designed to work at both 230V (UK and Europe) and also at 110V (US). Therefore if you have a mk4 pair of GHDs, then they will happily work in the US.

The Mk3 models are not however universal and are designed to work at 230V only. If you were to try and use a mk3 pair of GHDs in America, then in theory the should would work, but would take longer to heat up and may not get as hot. Practically however we have heard of GHDs failing after a while when used at 110V - whether this is connected with the lower voltage or rough handling on the plane we can't say at the moment. (have you tried it? If so, the please let us know what happened!).

Siobhan told us this: "Hi i was reading your website and i have a pair of 3.1 GHDS. I went to USA and tried to use them but noticed after a while they werent very hot. I thought they were broken as they are so old now. But then i heard this happens with mark 3's. They dont cut out but they dont even get hot enough for the light to flash to say they are at top temp. Just to let you know."

If you wanted to buy something to make your Mk3 GHDs work properly in the US, then you would need to get a step up transformer which takes 110V in and gives out 230V. GHD 3.1Bs are rated at a power of 35 watts so you would need to make sure your transformer can supply that amount of power. For example this item from Maplins might work, but we can't guarantee that, as we've never tested it! Note that other Mk3 models may be more powerful than this, so it's worth checking.

The only other difference between the UK and the US power supply is the frequency, however we don't believe the 60Hz vs 50Hz difference will have any effect.

This page was last updated at 6:08pm on 3rd January 2010