I’m breaking ground on my DIY pool tomorrow and I’m wondering where to put my light junction boxes. My pool equipment will be about 75’ away from my pool and I will have about 8-10 nichless lights. Should I spend the extra money on conduit to run all the lights back to the equipment or should I put the junctions closer to the pool to save on conduit? I have the lights already and they have 150’ cords so cable length is not an issue. Also is anyone using the Intermatic junction boxes with the built in transformer? Are they worth the price?
Pool Light Junction Box Location?
- Thread starter PaulMummolo
- Start date
- Nov 12, 2017
- 11,952
- Pool Size
- 12300
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-40
If I was building my own pool, I’d want a lot of lighting. And I’d want each light to home run back to the pad. I might run them off of one circuit, or I might split them in half. Or I might want to run each of them individually. Or some other scheme, that I might not even know I want until after I’ve had the pool up and running for a while. Like maybe being able to turn on a few lights when I'm just sitting by the pool, as opposed to lighting it up nice a bright for a nighttime swim party. Having each light home run back to the pad allows all these options. If you connect one or more lights together elsewhere, then the options dwindle.
In the grand scheme of things, conduit is cheap. Making changes later after all your landscaping and hardscaping is installed is not.
In the grand scheme of things, conduit is cheap. Making changes later after all your landscaping and hardscaping is installed is not.
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Bill1974
Well-known member
Just keep in mind how many bends you have in your conduit, so you can pull the wires easily. If you home run all of them thats great.
That won't save on conduit because you need conduit from the transformer to the junction box and from the junction box to the light.
It's the same amount of conduit either way.
It is defiantly not the same amount but I am running all home runs anyway.
I have 8 pool lights. Each run back to the equipment pad is approximately 100' so say 800' of pipe. Now, if I make the junction box 20' from the pool, I have 20' x 8 = 160' if I run two home runs to the equipment pad to the junction boxes at 80' each that is 160' so 320' total vs 800'.
- Nov 12, 2017
- 11,952
- Pool Size
- 12300
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-40
Frustrated by having only one giant light pointing right at my patio, I have fantasized about how I would have done it (pool was built by previous owner), especially if I had a spa.
At a minimum, I'd have the spa and pool on separate circuits. Maybe I'd want to light up only the spa, or maybe I'd want the spa dark while the pool is lit.
If I had lights all around the pool, I'd put all the lights that I could see from the house on one circuit, and/or all the lights that would shine in my eyes while sitting at my favorite spot on the patio at night, on their own circuit, then all the lights pointing away from me and the house on a third. That way, I could sit near my pool at night with some subtle ambient light coming from the pool, without being blasted in the eyes by pool lights, or see my pool gently lit from inside the house without having to see the light fixtures.
But during a party, I could light it up well enough to see every corner, and perhaps land a helicopter or help guide in the space shuttle.
And then I'd coordinate the control of the lights with the garden and patio lighting so that I could have any combination of lighting my mood might want.
As I said, I only have the one pool light, but I changed it to a colored LED, and then worked on the yard. This is just some of the moods:
By home-running each light, you'll be able to achieve so much more!
I chose to put my pool light on my home automation system, rather than the pool automation system. If you have HA, or might someday, you could give some thought as to how you might integrate pool lighting with your HA.
My "bistro" lights are on a dimmer. I wish everything else was, too. Not usually possible when there is a transformer involved, but dimming, position, color are all fun options to have.
- Oct 25, 2015
- 5,213
- Pool Size
- 25000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- CircuPool RJ-60 Plus
- Nov 12, 2017
- 11,952
- Pool Size
- 12300
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-40
I was joking about using the lights to land a helicopter. Jeez, you could land a sea plane in that!!
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It’s a bit bigger than the average pool, but it’s to scale with the lot size.
Second phase of plumbing.
Second phase of plumbing.
- Oct 25, 2015
- 5,213
- Pool Size
- 25000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- CircuPool RJ-60 Plus
Lotta big pumps too! Looks like they all have the large suction fittings!
This subject brings up a question on my build. Do you need to run lights to a J-Box? My electrical contractor ran my 3 lights directly into Intellicenter panel.
- Nov 12, 2017
- 11,952
- Pool Size
- 12300
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- Pentair Intellichlor IC-40
Depends on the type of light and the distance between it and the pad. My light, for example, has a permanent pigtail that must be pulled out through the conduit and niche. Because I have a J-box just a few feet from the light, that is a relatively easy chore. If I had to pull 100+ feet of tail out of that much conduit, especially if there were a lot of bends, that would be significantly harder, and potentially impossible after a few years.
Also, with some lights, like mine, the conduit is full of pool water. Again, there is only a few feet of conduit like that coming off of my pool. But if yours are like that, you've got all that conduit underground that could cause a potential leak! And if that leak happens under a slab of concrete, what is the fix (other than to abandon the light and seal it off).
Other lights, that are a bulb or fixture that is replaced in a different manner might not have these issues, so it depends on your type of light.
And there may or may not be building codes that has to be satisfied, which is something that is different in different jurisdictions.
Are you in mid-construction, or are you all done and everything is buried under concrete deck?
That said, this is a hijack of someone else's thread, and you should probably have your own, or maybe @Newdude can move your post to its own thread.
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- Oct 25, 2015
- 5,213
- Pool Size
- 25000
- Surface
- Plaster
- Chlorine
- Salt Water Generator
- SWG Type
- CircuPool RJ-60 Plus
I guess you can do it that way but I've never seen it like that. I usually see a j-box like you see in post #2 from @AQUA~HOLICS . One reason to do it this way may be that is makes repair/replace a little easier since connections are outside the panel? Doable either way though. I have 3 separate banks that are powered separately. On for spa, 3 for the pool and 3 for the sun-deck.
Chris
Yes, the main pump (left pump) is an XF, and is also the main spa pump.
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