Hi all,
Been doing a lot of reading on the forum as we're currently thinking about getting a spa. I'm sure I'll have a ton more questions once we progress (particularly on the chemical side of things, I'm currently studying the stickies on Chlorine and Bromine) but for now, an electrical set up question.
I understand the spa would need 220v/50a or 60a service. In our house, we have our main panel and a subpanel. The subpanel has all the circuits that are fed by the generator during a power outage (I'm in Northeast PA and it happens, one time we were out for 5 days - in May!). It's a manual cut over so we wheel the generator out of the garage to the driveway, start it up, plug in the giant wire and then flip a switch on the subpanel to take us from power company feed to generator feed with only select circuits getting power. The generator can handle 1 220 circuit (Could likely do more if all else was off) so our well pump is on it (no over, no dryer, no AC). We plan to use the spa all year round. My plan is to put the double pole 60a circuit in the subpanel (understanding I need to then put a spa panel 60a GFCI breaker box outside about 6' from the spa itself and these are all #6/3 wire runs per several of the spa places we've talked to). My thought is that when we flip to subpanel/generator power, I would shut the spa breaker off but then depending on projected power outage time, I could flip the well off, turn the spa on - thus not overloading the generator - and allow the spa to run for a bit to maintain circulation and heat levels and not risk a freeze if there is an extended power outage.
There shouldn't be an issue with this right? Since currently our well and many other things in the house run through the subpanel every day, I didn't envision this being a problem and also gave us a way to maintain the heat level during a power outage in freeze conditions.
Also - do people usually pull UF-B wire (direct burial with the big gray outer part - and generally a pain to work with) through conduit out to their spas or just use runs of individual THHN wire in appropriate colors of W, R, Bl and G?
thanks in advance!
Been doing a lot of reading on the forum as we're currently thinking about getting a spa. I'm sure I'll have a ton more questions once we progress (particularly on the chemical side of things, I'm currently studying the stickies on Chlorine and Bromine) but for now, an electrical set up question.
I understand the spa would need 220v/50a or 60a service. In our house, we have our main panel and a subpanel. The subpanel has all the circuits that are fed by the generator during a power outage (I'm in Northeast PA and it happens, one time we were out for 5 days - in May!). It's a manual cut over so we wheel the generator out of the garage to the driveway, start it up, plug in the giant wire and then flip a switch on the subpanel to take us from power company feed to generator feed with only select circuits getting power. The generator can handle 1 220 circuit (Could likely do more if all else was off) so our well pump is on it (no over, no dryer, no AC). We plan to use the spa all year round. My plan is to put the double pole 60a circuit in the subpanel (understanding I need to then put a spa panel 60a GFCI breaker box outside about 6' from the spa itself and these are all #6/3 wire runs per several of the spa places we've talked to). My thought is that when we flip to subpanel/generator power, I would shut the spa breaker off but then depending on projected power outage time, I could flip the well off, turn the spa on - thus not overloading the generator - and allow the spa to run for a bit to maintain circulation and heat levels and not risk a freeze if there is an extended power outage.
There shouldn't be an issue with this right? Since currently our well and many other things in the house run through the subpanel every day, I didn't envision this being a problem and also gave us a way to maintain the heat level during a power outage in freeze conditions.
Also - do people usually pull UF-B wire (direct burial with the big gray outer part - and generally a pain to work with) through conduit out to their spas or just use runs of individual THHN wire in appropriate colors of W, R, Bl and G?
thanks in advance!