Breaker tripping

[RSView]

Sorry, I didn't answer that part. No, that's not what that means. If the breaker was bad, or just weak, and was tripping under load, it would very likely do nothing while not under load, so that's not a legit troubleshooting conclusion. Jim has suggested to another here that you could go about this cheapest first.

Replace the breaker first.
Then the surge board.
Then the IC last.

The other way to look at it, is if you replace the IC first, and that isn't the problem, that's not money lost. You'll have a new one, and a backup. You'll still get all the chlorine you paid for out of each. You'd use the new one first, until its warranty expires, then plug in the old one until its done, then go back to the new one. The only possible loss is if the ICs come down in price after supply chain issues resolve. But it's just as likely their price will continue to rise, so that's a roll of the dice. See what I mean?

I had suggested to another here, having the same issues, to temporarily replace the breaker with a cheap 12 amp auto fuse. You'd have to be handy with such things (it's an unorthodox solution, that would require some klugie wiring), but it'd only be a few dollars. Those breakers aren't cheap. But if you're more of a plug-n-play sort, and wiring is not your thing, the replacement will be the much simpler option.

Sorry, I didn't mean to step on your troubleshooting with Jim. Too many cooks. He's our Pentair expert, so I defer to him...

I've followed this discussion with interest as I found my 12A breaker continually tripped. The pool guys here said that the breaker was bad, and being a new pool owner, I thought they knew what they were doing and replaced it. Nope, not the problem and the breaker was hard to find and expensive.

Since disconnecting the IC40 does not solve the problem the issue is highly probably to be the "surge" board. Again very expensive at over $250 and since I'm an electrical engineer I wondered what could be so esoteric that demanded that pricing. Imagine my surprise to find the board extremely simple. It has two purposes:

1. Surge protect the communication lines between system elements (I think the chlorinator and the main control board). This is done with a standard set of varistors attached to each of the comm lines. Varistors are cheap and effective. It's why this is called the "surge" board apparently.

2. Rectify the 24VAC power to 32VDC power for the IC40. This is done with a simple full wave bridge rectifier, which is basically 4 diodes arranged in a diamond pattern.

It turns out that the bridge rectifier component on my Surge board is shorted. This can happen from excess heat generated during operation and often occurs when the component is underspecified or too tight to actual operational tolerances. A new component is $4 at Mouser.com.

So, my approach on this is going to be to see if this is still under warranty, and if it isn't I'll replace the damaged rectifier with one that will handle 25A (with the same standard footprint). I'm guessing at this point but this setup seems a little "tacked on" to the design. Of course, my system is simpler because I don't have the iPH module, which apparently has it's own problems, perhaps of the same nature.

 

[Dirk]

I don't have the iPH module, which apparently has it's own problems, perhaps of the same nature.

It also has overcurrent problems from under-spec'd parts. Interesting analysis of the surge card. Thanks for that. I knew it was the rectifier, but I wasn't clear on why it was called a surge card.

You left off the one important component that explains the replacement price: the little Pentair logo!

 

[RSView]

It also has overcurrent problems from under-spec'd parts. Interesting analysis of the surge card. Thanks for that. I new it was the rectifier, but I wasn't clear on why it was called a surge card.

You left off the one important component that explains the replacement price: the little Pentair logo!

In another thread I described the actual replacement of the bridge rectifier. Yep, that was the problem and I'm back up and running.

And it seems like you're 100% right about the price premium for that logo. A quick survey shows that the entire BOM (Bill of Materials) cost with components and connectors in 1000 volume is likely less than $7.... Then add in inventory, distribution, etc. and I figure the margin is still well above 1000%.