Pentair 250 Heater

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kwolfe

0
Mar 28, 2013
60
Central PA
Hey Folks,
Hoping you all can point me in the right direction. Went to turn on the heater for the first time this past week and the touch panel wasn't coming on. On first inspection, it looks like a spider crawled in between the touch panel in the plastic on the cover to make himself (or herself) and nice home. Not sure if that's the issue but thought I would mention it.

Got out my volt meter and tested the power coming in and all was good there. Next I got into the sliver metal box (don't know what it's call) on the inside once removing the front panel. I notice that the small glass tube fuse was blown. Ordered and now installed. Still nothing. One video mentioned removing the ribbon from the panel and using a screwdriver to jump the first two pins that the ribbon inserts over (ones closest to the yellow button). I tried that and still nothing (unless I'm doing it wrong).

This is where I am stuck now. I can find any more info on where to hunt next unless I should just order a new board and hope for the best. I was really hoping the pin jump would work because at least the answer is a simple one.
 
Confirm your heater is not connected to any automation and controlled by the fireman’s switch?

Check the fireman’s switch jumper is connected.

Check for chewed wires and rats nesting in the heater over the winter.

Pentair MasterTemp Heaters - Further Reading

www.troublefreepool.com www.troublefreepool.com
 
Also may be worth checking the output of your transformer. Should read ~24 vac usually a little higher. Whatever blew the fuse could have fried the secondary of the transformer. Fuse should protect it but doesn't always.

Chris
 
So the plot thickens. I was measuring voltage and was getting 240v at the heater. Might be fine except for the fact that I wired it at 120v!!!! Called my best friend who is an electrician and it turns out that the red and white wires in my subpanel were switched so the red was going to the neutral bar. No clue how this happened. Pool ran fine last year and I have screwed around with that panel since I put it in. Good news is, now the GFI for the pool lights stopped tripping and they come on woohoo.

I found that transformer. It has three wires going into the bottom (brown white and black). Black to white I get 120v. The brown wire doesn't seem to have any power. On top of that transformer is a plug with a blue and yellow wire going into it. I don't get any voltage on that side. New tube fuse is still good.
 
Not clear to me where you are. You put 240V into the heater set for 120V. You probably damaged the transformer. Not sure what else got zapped. Maybe the blower motor.

@ps0303 @Pool Clown @swamprat69 any experience fixing a heater that ran on 240 when set to 120v?
 
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Yup. 240v to a heater that was hooked to 120v. Have a new transformer coming Saturday. I guess we will go from there. Not sure what else it could damaged. The heater can be hooked up as either. I chose 120v when installing.

Another thought on any other damage. If the voltage immediately fried the transformer which meant the control panel never worked, I think the blower motor and other things should be OK. They would have never gotten power. Fingers crossed. I'm hoping the panel is OK as well. I inspected it and it didn't look burnt or like any had cooked.
 
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So I got the new transformer installed and am getting 27v out of the other side so that's good. Problem is, it's still not working. I tried taking out the touch panel ribbon cable and jumping the first two pins and I get nothing. Is there a way to test the control board or is it more like that it's cooked? It doesn't looked burnt or anything.
 
kwolfe said:
New tube fuse is still good.
Click to expand...
Are you sure the fuse is still good? Check it with a meter. If the transformer fried the fuse usually blows. Wouldn't hurt to check with a meter or check for 24 vac "downstream of the fuse to ground. Next thing I'd check is the power distribution board itself. Are there any burned contacts on it?

Chris
 
Is the power distribution board the control board that's under the touch pad? That looks fine. Also, what does that little fuse go to? It's weird because even with that fuse blown, I can still get 24v on the other side of the transformer.
 

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Difficult to tell anything without seeing how all of the wiring is hooked up and whether the heater is using the 120v black 12 pin plug or the 240v red 12 pin plug. If using the 120v black 12 pin plug and has worked for years up to this point, then how was it supplied with 240v with no electrical changes. I have seen non- electrician remodeling changes in a house in which 2 separate 120v circuits drawn from separate legs of the 240 volt supply but using a single common (neutral) leg have supplied 240 volts to both of the 120v circuits when the common (neutral) leg was removed ( or possibly experienced opening of this common [neutral] leg due to a poor connection), blowing all lights/loads in 1 120v circuit and destroying the furnace circuitboard and loads in the second (furnace) circuit.
 
So don't ask me how this happened but here is how it went. Out of the three wires coming from the house to the subpanel, the black was where it should be however the red was hooked to the neutral bar and the white was where the red should have gone. I originally wired the heater for 120v with the 120v plug. However when turning it on this year for the first time, there was 240v going to the heater hence the issues.
 
Since you know you have voltage out of the secondary (low voltage side) of the transformer, you should check the components on your operating control looking for any signs of overheating ( browning or blackening) of components on the board or the board itself or obviously blown components. Also check the back side of the board where the solder tracing is for the same. If all looks good, disconnect all connections to the operating control and then replace the fuse and just the 24 volt connection from the transformer to your operating control. If the fuse doesn't blow then, replace connections one at a time to the operating control to isolate when the fuse blows and what is causing the fuse to blow. Your electrician friend can probably help you with troubleshooting and isolating the cause of the problem after correcting the problem that caused the original 240 volt feed to the heater.
 
OK so slight update. I got a new fuse and installed it, turned on the power and all was well. I get 26v coming out of the transformer and 26v at the fuse for the firemans switch. The touchpad still id not work so I did what the tech in the video did. I removed the ribbon connector and used a screwdriver to jump the first two pins closest to the yellow button on the control board. That blew the fuse which really sucks becasue they are $9 a piece. I need to look for a local generic source.
 
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