Swapping a circuit breaker - Am I gonna kill myself?

Erandus

So here's the story.

I have a hot tub. The hot tub is ungrounded. The breaker feeding it is NOT a GFI breaker, which allowed the hot tub to power surge above its rating without tripping the breaker, but enough to burn out a transformer in the tub.

The tub is fully repaired, but the breaker still needs to be exchanged. I bought a new GFI breaker correctly rated for my tub from an electrical supply store. I had an offer from an electrician that lives nearby to come do the rewiring, but he's backed out and left me hanging. I need the old breaker pulled out, and the new breaker wired in, as well as a ground wire attacked to the grounding lug in the hot tub.

Is this even sort of a project that it's realistic for me to do without fricasseeing my brains out or something? Or should I not even be considering that and just looking for a cheap electrician?

Gopherboy128

Regardless of price: call a -LICENSED- electrician! You won't regret it.

Robman

Call an electrician. Your house burning down because you wired something wrong isn't worth saving a hundred bucks.

Erandus

Thats sorta what I figured. I've already got some requests for quotes out on websites of local electritions. I figured I'd just flip a thread out there and see if the consensus was "you will kill yourself you tard".

Which it appears to be.

Gopherboy128

I was raised on "If you have to ask, the answer is no" Basically, why save $100 and burn your house down... or screw up your newly-repaired hot tub, again?!

musanman

rule of thumb is not to fuck with something that can have catastrophic failure as a result

gas lines and electricity are the two I won't even consider messing with

TeeMan

musanman wrote: »

rule of thumb is not to fuck with something that can have catastrophic failure as a result

gas lines and electricity are the two I won't even consider messing with

Especially when grounding is concerned. Ask around your circle of friends to see if they've had good business with an electrician before. I've always trusted the power of word-of-mouth regarding tradesmen over advertising and I haven't had much trouble with them in the past.

Mom2Kat

Oh good I am glad we finally found out what happened to your tub.

As for doing the breaker yourself, don't do it. Like everyone else has been saying get a liscensed electrician to do it. Sitting in a huge pot of hot water is not when you want to find out something is going sparky sparky.

I myself am still without tub as when we were filling for the New Years Festivities I discovered that the filter cannister has finally gone. I can not clamp the top on tight enought to keep it from leaking. But this is actually good news since the filter dumb previous owner put in wwas a POOL sized filter. So looking forward to haveing a smaller filter to soak and replace.

Erandus

Fill cannister? Wtf are those? This seems like a thing I should know about. I wonder if I have one.

Yeah I won't be doing the electrical work myself. I'm kinda annoyed at the guy who said he was going to do the work for me. He said he'd love to come over and fix it for me, and then stopped returning my calls and texts. The kind of not returning where it would go to voicemail after 2-3 rings so I know he saw it was me calling and sent me to voicemail. After a few weeks of this, I called him from my cell, and got sent to voicemail, and then called him from one of the kids' cellphones and he answered. :P

A guy who lives across the street is building a new house, and works in construction, so I'm sure I can get a good reference to an electrician from him.

Gopherboy128

Also might try calling a local pool/spa store? See if they have any references.

Edit: Also, most homeowners insurance requires work to be done by licensed professionals (at least mine does) but I don't know about your situation, but that is why I strongly reccomend a licensed electrician do the work.

Erandus

Well, the electrician I talked to this morning tells me that the way in which the spa store guy told us we needed the thing wired is illegal, and the way it actually NEEDS to be wired is 3-400 dollars and does not require the 100 dollar part we already bought on recommendation from the spa store.

I am displeased.

Usagi

Well, being displeased is one thing, but listen to the licensed electrician. The store is trying to keep your business, so they want you to feel like you got a good deal - good deals do not always mean the correct service or advice.

Erandus

I have another electrician who agreed to come out this afternoon, take a look and give me recommendations and an estimate for free, so we'll see what happens. This guy didn't bat an eye when I told him what I wanted. The other guy wanted to sell me all sorts of extra disconnects and make the wiring sound like a big deal. I dunno, I'm gonna get as many people looking at this and giving me an assessment as I can reasonably find in the next couple days.

I need to call the spa store that fixed the hot tub when they open in 45 minutes, and talk to the guy who told me exactly what I needed to do to get this fixed. What he says and what the first electrician said are completely at odds. I realize the electrician is an electrician, but I was told by the spa repair guy that most electricians don't know much about spa wiring.

I feel like a bunch of people are telling me a bunch of conflicting things.

matt has a problem

I think a lot of people are trying to screw you over. A GFI breaker is a GFI breaker. You pull out the old one, detach the wires, attach the wires to the new one, push it in place, and screw down the ground wire. Unless they're actually talking about running new wiring from your main breaker box to the hot tub, this is a 5 minute job that takes exactly one screwdriver.

Erandus

The first electrician told me that I did not need a GFI breaker in my circuit box, but that I did need a GFI disconnect "within 50 feet of my hot tub". Well my circuit box is about 20 feet from my hot tub.

Also, the spa repair guy is the one who told me that a GFI breaker in my breaker box would do me just fine, and while he's not an electrician, he's seen more than his share of hot tubs and hot tub wiring, and more than an electrician.

Gonna get some opinions from electricians, compare with opinion from the spa repair guy, and see what I come up with.

matt has a problem

I don't know what good a GFI disconnect would do you if the hot tub isn't somehow plugged into it. You need a GFI breaker that the power for the hot tub runs through, so the connection trips fast in case the tub shorts.

It would be good if any outlets near the tub were also GFI, same as ones around the sink in your kitchen and tub in your bathroom etc, but that's more for risk of splashes and devices potentially plugged into them falling into water. But it's not necessary.

Erandus

There are no outlets near the tub. Currently the hot tub is not plugged in to ANY outlet. It's wired directly into the circuit breaker. It's also not grounded. So I get that currently the thing is basically a death trap. I know a wiring change is nessecary, I'm just not sure to what extent, currently.

matt has a problem

Then you just need a GFI breaker in your breaker box. The existing wiring from the hot tub screws into it, and it has its own ground wire that you screw to your breaker box.

Erandus

I hope thats what the electrician coming to look at it today agrees to.

Mom2Kat

About the Filter cannister it is the probably cylander thing somewhere near your pump/spa pack. You will want to swap out the filter every month or so and completley replace about every few years. I run a 2 filter system. When I change the filter I soak in filter cleaner the dirty one and then it is ready for the next swap.

Again plugging this site here is a picture of 2 different filter canisters. also check out thier info section, lots of good stuff there.

Erandus

My filter is similar to this, with a plastic piece capping the compartment in the corner of the tub that floats up to the water level.

Gopherboy128

I am not an electrician. However, from what you've said, it sounds like a GFI-breaker is what you'd need. The GFI-breaker is your "outlet" like you have near your kitchen or bathroom sinks. The tub would get wired to the GFI-outlet and grounded to your main ground that your whole house is grounded to via the breaker panel box.

I think the first electrician wasn't familiar with spa's and the spa guy isn't an electrician... so keep getting estimates.

Mom2Kat

Cool that is much easier to change than mine. I have to take a piece of my deck off and drop into a hole to get the filter cap off. Ah the trade offs of having the tub built into the deck or having it free standing.

Erandus

Well, what the spa guy suggested was that we get a GFI breaker put in our breaker panel, and have the spa continue to be wired directly to the breaker via that. There would be no "outlet" and, in fact, my spa does not currently have a "plug" it is wired directly from the control box to the breaker panel. So rather than having a spa plugged into a GFI enabled outlet, then wired to a traditional breaker, I "intend" to have my spa wired directly into a GFI enabled breaker, skipping having any sort of outlet.

Mom2Kat

That is simillar to mine. I am hard wired from the main breaker to a GFCI beside the tub. It is almost a small sub panel with just the tub's GFCI there.

Erandus

Mom2Kat wrote: »

Cool that is much easier to change than mine. I have to take a piece of my deck off and drop into a hole to get the filter cap off. Ah the trade offs of having the tub built into the deck or having it free standing.

The top center picture in this picture collage is actually very similar to what I have. That little green plastic cylinder floats up to the top of the water level to help filter out big shit like leaves, and you can screw it off to get to the filter. I dont have to open up the cabinet, which is nice.

My tub is built into a deck too, I have to crack open a hatch and stuff as well, but fortunately I can get to the filter without that hassle.

Erandus

Mom2Kat wrote: »

That is simillar to mine. I am hard wired from the main breaker to a GFCI beside the tub. It is almost a small sub panel with just the tub's GFCI there.

What the spa repair guy suggested we do is just wire directly to the GFCI breaker in the breaker panel, and have no outlet involved anywhere.

Gopherboy128

Yeah, if your spa is like 20' from the breaker panel then that should be close enough to just run a GFI breaker. Research shows, like you said, within 50'. Again, get a licensed electrician to do it and they will get you sorted out.

Erandus

Gopherboy128 wrote: »

Yeah, if your spa is like 20' from the breaker panel then that should be close enough to just run a GFI breaker. Research shows, like you said, within 50'. Again, get a licensed electrician to do it and they will get you sorted out.

Yeah, thats why I'm gettign 2nd and 3rd and 4th opinions right now. The first electrician told me that I'd have to have a GFI outlet by the hot tub because the GFI disconnect has to be within 50 feet. When I said my breaker panel was less than 20 feet away from the tub, he said "oh well it has to be outside too". I said "well what if it's an indoor tub?" and he said "oh well, it has to be readily accessable too".

I dunno, something about it just smacked of him coming up with excuses and shit for me to have to buy the extra stuff he wanted to sell me.

Mushiwulf

Generally disconnects need to be "within sight" in addition to the distance requirements, but I would have to look up the exact code for spas, as I am more familiar with air conditioning equipment requirements.

Erandus

Just had one of my 2nd opinion electricians in to look it over. He said wiring in the GFCI breaker directly to the tub is perfectly fine. Gave me an estimate of 150 dollars to rewire and add in the grounding, which was about 75 cheaper than every estimate I'd gotten so far. He's coming back at 8am tomorrow and then I should officially get my goddamn tub back.