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The story to that is that Australia wasn't always 240V. Into the 1950's the general situation was Victoria was on 230V, South Australia 210V, Western Australia 250V, and the rest on 240. Some country towns with their own generating plant had DC.

Even in a small country such as the U.K. we had a similar situation. Nominal supply voltages varied 200 to 250V from area to area, although in later years the higher end became the more common: 220, 230, 240, or 250V. Appliances such as heaters, toasters, etc. were marked for the full range, sometimes with the tag also specifying the actual wattage dissipation at the ends of the range. More sensitive equipment such as radios and TV sets came with voltage adjustments which had to be set for the area of use.

Right up until the late 1950s/early 1960s era we also had 3-wire D.C. distribution in the older parts of some towns.

We finally standardized on 240V with allowable +/-6% tolerance in the early 1970s.