Pool/Yard lights not responding ??

[jedi5]

Hello everyone.

New pool owner who is trying his best to navigate the world of being a pool owner.

Just purchased a home with an ingroud pool and Hayward Omnilogic panel.
From the selling agent and the pictures online, the pool/yard lights do work.

For the life of me, I can't figure out how to turn either the pool or yard lights on.
I'm looking at the Omnilogic panel and I can see it is programmed for both pool and yard lights.
The pool does have a water fall feature and the water fall lights do turn on.
But no pool or yard lights are able to turn on.

I've tried to do some research on basic "how to" and all I got was to reset/flip the switch at the breaker box which I did
or look for a tripped GCFI outlet, which I've also done.
Also saw a video on YouTube about synching the lights? Well I tried that as well.

Short of that, I don't know what else to do.

Before I call a pool company out, I was wondering if there is anything else I can try or someone might be able to suggest?
I'd really hate to call a pool company out only to find out is a very simple fix of some switch I didn't see or read about.

Thanks!

 

[dfwnoob]

Hi jedi5, welcome to TFP!

Just to make sure I understand correctly - you see a button for the yard lights on the OmniLogic controller? Do you have an indoor panel or can you control it from your phone? Just trying to see exactly what we're dealing with here.

 

[jedi5]

Hi Df

Thanks for responding to my question.

Correct, there is button for lights on the Omnilogic panel and ability to schedule the lights as well.
On the panel I can see all the fixed light colors as well the available color shows.

Also using the Hayward app on iOS and I am able to control the pool features minus the lights.

 

[Dirk]

When you say "new pool owner" do you mean you purchased a house with a pool and now you're trying to figure out how the house/pool works? I can't help you with Omnilogic, as I'm a Pentair guy. But one of your troubleshooting steps should be checking the light fixtures and bulbs. It may be that both just stopped working at some point, and the previous owner never bothered to fix them. Just the kind of thing that a real estate disclosure would "accidentally" leave off! Some of those types of lights, especially pool lights, can be very expensive, so "leaving them for the next guy" wouldn't be surprising.

You'd have to better describe what and where your lights are for how best to troubleshoot them (voltage, AC or DC, underwater or not, etc).

In the meantime, welcome to TFP!

 

[jedi5]

Sorry, new pool owner as bought a house that has a pool.

Oh I didn't think about pool lights maybe not working.
Or maybe stopped working for that matter.

I'm just going off what the agent stated and seeing the pictures online.
The pictures do or did show the lights working fine.

Of course, these pictures are from 11/21...

Edit: These are under water lights. Only water fall lights work. And of course the yard lights. They are all tied into the Omnilogic panel. Don't know the voltage or any other info.

 

[Dirk]

Well, you started in the right place, to determine if the OmniLogic is doing what it's supposed to, or not. But if that's a dead end, then the next step is to find where the lights tie into it, disconnect them, and apply the proper voltage (level and AC or DC) and see if the lights go on. If they do, then it's the OmniLogic, if they don't then it's external to OmniLogic.

The easiest way to do that is to use the OmniLogic. If an OmniLogic light circuit is working (we'll call that "A"), and the others aren't (we'll call them "B" and "C"), then you swap the wires where they connect inside your OmniLogic. If light "A" now works when connected to where either "B" or "C" was, then OmniLogic is fine. Conversely, if either "B" or "C" don't work when connected to where "A" was connected, then it's the underground wiring or the fixture or the bulb.

Basic troubleshooting is to try and cut the problem in half, to narrow down the search. You take something you know works, and plug it into something that doesn't, or vice versa, and see what happens.

IMPORTANT: don't mess with any pool electrical without first turning off all the breakers that go to any of the pool equipment. In a new-to-you house, don't trust any labels or make any assumptions that the wiring was done in a logical way, or that it's up to code. It's probably all fine, but don't bet your four-figure pool components, or your family's safety, on that. If you're not 100% confident in house and pool wiring techniques, then call in a licensed electrician. He could probably find the problem in 15 minutes.

 

[jedi5]

@Dirk

I just went to the Omnilogic panel again to play with lights hoping maybe I could get lucky and they turn on.
When I go to turn on the lights and pick a theme, I get the "it will take 1 minute to process" and I can hear some clicking.
Of course I went to try this while the sun is out and of course I can't see a difference, LOL.

Would I call an electrician to come out or the pool company who installed the panel?

Ask me to replace a socket, outlet, or light fixture, and I'm with you.
I don't know if I have the comfort to open up the panel and start to pull wires.

 

[Dirk]

I don't know if I have the comfort to open up the panel and start to pull wires.

It's good to recognize that and not take any chances. If you have access to the original installer, then that's probably the way to go. If they know their stuff, they'll probably know more about the Omni than any random electrician you could find.

 

[1poolman1]

@Dirk

I just went to the Omnilogic panel again to play with lights hoping maybe I could get lucky and they turn on.
When I go to turn on the lights and pick a theme, I get the "it will take 1 minute to process" and I can hear some clicking.
Of course I went to try this while the sun is out and of course I can't see a difference, LOL.

Would I call an electrician to come out or the pool company who installed the panel?

Ask me to replace a socket, outlet, or light fixture, and I'm with you.
I don't know if I have the comfort to open up the panel and start to pull wires.

If you contact an electrician, he or she MUST be familiar with pools in general and pool automation specifically. There is a great difference in wiring a house and wiring pool automation. Getting power to the panel is one thing they all can do well. While it shouldn't, the mix of 240v, 120, 12v all in one panel gets confusing to most regular electricians. How these systems work, what the requirements are for the various pieces of equipment, all take experience that most electricians don't have.
Not putting electricians down, one of my grandsons is a very good one, but pool automation makes no sense to him. If there is a good pool store local to you, that might be a good place to get a recommendation.