Pentair Amerlite not working

[mhu4]

Hi everyone,

I have what appears to be a Pentair Amerlite. House was built around 1988. It has the old 120v style bulb. This is a rental house and the owner doesn't give a Crud about it unless it's about to fall over so I have to figure most of this stuff out myself.

I found the only breaker in the garage that has GFCI on it and it's on and breaker has 120v going out of the leads. No other breakers are off in the panels. I am getting 0 voltage at the light. I heard about overheating protection, is there a way that can go bad and fail off permanently? I am going under the house tomorrow to try to trace the wiring from the tube and see if it comes out in the crawl space so I could maybe replace it. The fixtures are expensive so I hope it's something else like a cut wire.

Appreciate any insights.

 

[mhu4]

Second question, say replacement is in order. It is an 8.5" light, any recommendations for new parts?

 

[ajw22]

Find the light junction box around the pool. Chances are the cord on the light runs to a pool light junction box and not all the way to the circuit breaker panel. That is done so the light and its cord can easily be replaced.

Pentair Amerilites were 6” for spa lights and 10” for pool lights. Only a few high watt pool lights are available now.

Amerlite® Underwater Incandescent Lights

Add lighting to your pool with Amerlite, the world standard of reliability for underwater pool lights. Shop the Amerlite collection from Pentair here.

www.pentair.com

 

[Bill1974]

It may have been disconnected for a reason. Since it's a rental and I am guessing you are the tenant I would not replace the light (they are pretty pricey, unless your landlord is going to repay you). If you find the junction box you should be able to check for continuity to see if the thermal overload is a one and done or a bimetallic resetting overload. if the fixture is good and all the other wiring is good and it's gfci protected a new bulb and gasket should be all you need. The gasket around the lens is not supposed to reused. Also the bulb in these are not your typical 100W bulbs, they are usually 350W to 500W and a bit pricey as well. If all works out I would put in a LED bulb. I have this one in a larger 10 inch light

 

[mhu4]

It may have been disconnected for a reason. Since it's a rental and I am guessing you are the tenant I would not replace the light (they are pretty pricey, unless your landlord is going to repay you). If you find the junction box you should be able to check for continuity to see if the thermal overload is a one and done or a bimetallic resetting overload. if the fixture is good and all the other wiring is good and it's gfci protected a new bulb and gasket should be all you need. The gasket around the lens is not supposed to reused. Also the bulb in these are not your typical 100W bulbs, they are usually 350W to 500W and a bit pricey as well. If all works out I would put in a LED bulb. I have this one in a larger 10 inch light

Thanks. I'll try to find the junction box. it does not appear to be above ground. The crawl space is to the right of the pool and I think the chase goes there. The bulb was good, i verified it with a multimeter because it was a 500 watt bulb and I didn't want to fry my lamp testing it. I put a regular bulb in it just for testing and that didn't turn on either, and I tested that bulb to make sure it was good first. I already ordered a gasket kit and set screws because the old screw was corroded and I had to drill the head off to wrench it out. If I get this working I'm getting an LED color changing bulb for it.

It's definitely on the nice to have list but if it doesn't work out I'll look into something else. Just figured I'd do the hard work while the pool is empty.

 

[ajw22]

Is there a diving board? Old pools used to have junction boxes placed under the diving board before the NEC required them to be four feet from the pool.

Also, look within overgrown plants around the pool.

If you'd like to share some pictures of the pool and surrounding area, we may identify areas to investigate.

 

[mhu4]

Find the light junction box around the pool. Chances are the cord on the light runs to a pool light junction box and not all the way to the circuit breaker panel. That is done so the light and its cord can easily be replaced.

Pentair Amerilites were 6” for spa lights and 10” for pool lights. Only a few high watt pool lights are available now.

Amerlite® Underwater Incandescent Lights

Add lighting to your pool with Amerlite, the world standard of reliability for underwater pool lights. Shop the Amerlite collection from Pentair here.

www.pentair.com

View attachment 649914

Thanks for that info, I was measuring the inside diameter. The OD on mine is indeed 10" and the housing does say Amerlite on the inside.

 

[mhu4]

Is there a diving board? Old pools used to have junction boxes placed under the diving board before the NEC required them to be four feet from the pool.

Also, look within overgrown plants around the pool.

If you'd like to share some pictures of the pool and surrounding area, we may identify areas to investigate.

No diving board unfortunately. No boxes in the room itself, none outside in the yard. I cut back all the vegetation and did a large gardening project and would have noticed. To the right side of the pool is where the crawl space is. The light PVC chase goes back for 1-2" and then turns. The breaker panel for everything is probably 12' to the right side of the pool there, 2 rooms over. I'm thinking the wire goes under the house in the crawl space and then goes up into the panel. My full PPE suit gets here in like an hour and then I'm going to go diving under the house to see what I find.

 

[Bill1974]

The junction box would likely be a foot or two above the water level of the pool.

I would have guessed in the circled area or on the wall where the arrow is pointing. Was this pool always enclosed? If not would guess outside where in the circled area or towards where the arrow is pointing.

Where is the pool equipment located? It's possible it was run back to that area. Typically in conduit there is an junction box or pull box every 360° of conduit bends or less so it's not to difficult to pull the wire.

 

[Bill1974]

The junction boxes typically look like this.

 

[mhu4]

The junction box would likely be a foot or two above the water level of the pool.

I would have guessed in the circled area or on the wall where the arrow is pointing. Was this pool always enclosed? If not would guess outside where in the circled area or towards where the arrow is pointing.

Where is the pool equipment located? It's possible it was run back to that area. Typically in conduit there is an junction box or pull box every 360° of conduit bends or less so it's not to difficult to pull the wire.

View attachment 650462

The circle area doesn't have anything. I cleaned up the pool cover and there's no access ports or anything. The arrow on the wall is where a humidistat and thermostat is and some environment monitoring equipment. Pool was enclosed always. I looked everywhere outside and didn't see anything. The pool equipment is in the furnace room. There's many junction boxes but I traced them all to either the furnaces and 2 pool pumps.

The junction boxes typically look like this.
View attachment 650464 View attachment 650465 View attachment 650466 View attachment 650467

I'll keep looking but haven't found anything yet. Going under the house didn't yield anything. There's a spot over a foundation wall that is only about 1' tall that I would need to crawl through to get to that area and I don't know if me and my front butt can squeeze through it and not get stuck.

I'll keep looking.

 

[mhu4]

I did just find this that was previously obscured by detritus from a furnace project that is ongoing. This is the only thing I can't trace in the room. It has black/white/green coming up from the pipe in the cement and then also other black/white/greens going to the 2 tubes. Trying to figure out best way to test continuity on those. Box is roughly 7' away from electrical panel. Is the function of the other pipe possibly to the switch? I assume one feeds power from the panel, goes to the switch, then goes to the light. Am I correct?

 

[ajw22]

Yup, looks like you found the junction box.

Can you open it up and show us how it is wired?

 

[mhu4]

Yup, looks like you found the junction box.

Can you open it up and show us how it is wired?

 

[ajw22]

The wiring looks like the three circuits are in series.

Looks correct if you have a light and a light switch in line wired to a circuit breaker

 

[mhu4]

also the only switch that doesn't do anything on the panel for the pool room lighting only reads 32v AC in one position. Not sure what that means.

 

[JamesW]

Are there 2 lights?

It looks like maybe 2 lights wired in series?

You probably need to have an electrician check it out unless you are very capable with electricity.

 

[mhu4]

Are there 2 lights?

It looks like maybe 2 lights wired in series?

You probably need to have an electrician check it out unless you are very capable with electricity.

From what I saw and what ajw22 said it looks like one light and a light switch. Which makes sense with the 2 conduits. One conduit would be coming from the panel, the other conduit goes to the light switch, and the hole in the concrete floor goes to the pool light. I think I need to figure out where the voltage discrepancy is happening and also find what breaker it is tied to.

 

[mhu4]

I found the breaker that powers that circuit. It is indeed the only breaker that has a GFCI trip on it. If i traced the lines right I get 120v from the breaker hot black to the white neutral that runs back in that same conduit. From the switch conduit black to the breaker white I only get 31-34v depending. There appears to be some wiring gremlins on the switch portion.

 

[JamesW]

The wire colors make me question the ability of the person who installed the wiring.

Most likely, it was not installed by a professional electrician and I would question the safety of the wiring.

You should probably have an electrician check everything.