NEMA 6 is limiting because there’s no neutral, so everything in the device has to run on 240V. Your oven and dryer want 120V to run lights and electronics, so they use a 14 (or 10 for older installs) which lets them get 120V between a hot and the neutral.

Oddly, 14-50 has become the most common receptacle for non-hardwired EV charging, which is rather wasteful since EV charging doesn’t need the neutral at all. 6-50 would make more sense there.

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bryanlarsen 3 days ago | parent [-]

Reasons why it's nice to have a 14-50 plug in your garage rather than a 6-50:

1: when an uncle stops by for a visit with his RV he can plug in.

2: the other outlets in your garage are likely on a shared circuit. The 14-50 is dedicated, so with a 14-50 to 5-15 adapter you can more safely plug in a high wattage appliance, like a space heater.

	▲	wat10000 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		1 is why we ended up with 14-50 as the standard, too. Before there was much charging infrastructure, RV parks were a good place to get a semi-fast charge, and that meant a charger with a 14-50 plug. 2 is something I never thought of, I’ll have to keep that in mind.