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DON'T EVEN THINK OF DOING THIS! (*** See Note below.) In general the answer has to be: "Not if they have been designed to run only on the lower voltage." If an appliance does its job at 120 Volts then it won't actually work any better for you even if it could be modified to run at the higher voltage. A licensed electrician or professional electrical engineer would be able to consider whether or not a particular 120 Volt appliance could be modified safely to run at the higher voltage but it won't usually be worth the cost of doing the work. It would usually cost much less to buy an appliance, new or secondhand, designed to run on 240 Volts. *** Note: If the 240 Volt supply is in USA or Canada or other countries using similar 60 Hz mains supplies, there would be no change in motor speed so that won't be an issue to worry about BUT there is a much more serious problem that should be kept in mind: it is just not safe to use a low-wattage appliance and travel voltage adapter on a 60 Hz 240 volt supply because the breakers and/or fuses on the main supply panel for the 60 Hz 240 Volt circuit would not be able to protect a 120 Volt appliance and travel adapter from fire!

SO DON'T EVEN THINK OF DOING THAT!

Further information which may be useful to mention here but is not part of the answer to this question: Some appliances, such as electric shavers, etc., have been designed to run safely on different supply voltages. If that is the case the appliance's rating plate will state the range of suitable voltages.

In many cases where the power needed is low, such as (say) less than 30 Watts, a cheap and simple "International Travel Adapter" is all that is needed to make it work. But bear in mind that the mains frequency in Europe and other 230 Volt areas is 50 Hz (Cycles per second) compared to 60 Hz in US, Canada and other 120 Volt areas. Some 60 Hz appliances will work fine but others with simple motors will run too slow on the lower frequency of 50 Hz. It is not possible to use a standard kind of International Travel Adapter for high-powered appliances such as electric kettles because the current they take is much too high. 120 Volt appliances having powers from (say) 100 Watts to 2000 Watts (2kW), or more, would need an expensive item called a "Transformer" or "Auto-transformer" to enable them to be used on a 240 Volt supply. Such Transformers are much bigger and heavier than an International Travel Adapter and much more expensive - they can cost from US$100 upwards, even second-hand, depending on the power to be converted. So most folks would buy an appliance designed to work on 240 Volts.

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Q: Would 120 volts 60 Hz appliances work on 240 volts 60 Hz?
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