iconv - bad encoding

Hello I noticed a problem using iconv, but investigation showed, that this is not exectly the iconv itself, but something like php encoding. From the beginning: a hava an incoming variable $text; it has some Polish diactics 'strona główna'. I expect to remove diactics : 'strona glowna'. So I use iconv: iconv('utf-8', 'us-ascii//TRANSLIT', $text) and unfortunetly i get: 'strona g??wna' ... But only under apache, in browser The same file, command, etc run from bash gives: 'strona glowna' ... OK So i think : "bad config", but double checked and configs are identical... (cli and apache2) Best part: for 2 or 3 times after starting computer (debian), it didn't worker until I did: (apache start && apache stop - not apache restart), then it worked. Now it doesn't work any more. No other config (except php was changed). Any ideas?