Pool Bonding - Spooky

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thomearl

thomearl

0
Apr 25, 2015
101
Pasadena, CA
Okay so i dont know if its just because I'm a pool owner now, but i am noticing a number of instances of people dying in pools due to electrical shock. I don't want to be alarmist, but i need more info on pool bonding. I only learned of this term a few weeks ago. I thought it only had to do with pool lites, but I believe now any electrical part of the system has the potential to shock a swimmer if the pool isn't properly bonded. Is this correct?

I dont know when my pool was built, but it does have a number of electrical components, pump, swg, heater, spa, so it's starting to spook me that i dont know whether it was built correctly. To me it looks like a well done setup as i have a breaker panel right at the pool site for all the components, but i just dont know.

My questions are:

Is there a way for ME to easily tell if its bonded?

If not, who would i hire to check, a regular electrician or a pool builder?

What's involved in having it properly bonded, would i need to rip out all the connections underground?

When did they start bonding pools, has it been around for a number of years or recent development?
 
All that I can tell you is that bonding is not the same as grounding. And the only grounding that you have to worry about is ensuring that any electrical equipment connected directly to the pool (usually just the pump) is grounded. (I don't think it's possible to NOT have a grounded connection there.) This is the immediate concern. In my experience, if you bring up "bonding" to a regular everyday electrician they think you are talking about grounding. I've tried. Apparently this whole bonding thing is sort of a mystery.

Most people don't even know what bonding is and have no clue whether or not they have "bonded" their pool. I don't fully understand it either. But what I did (after researching online and haphazardly thinking I understood what it was) is run a 12ga solid copper wire from the pump to the outside metal frame of my pool. (Above ground pool.) I don't remember the research in full that I did 6 years ago, but from what I remember this is the bare minimum to be considered "bonded". Bonding involves running copper wire to all sorts of surfaces around/near the pool to offer some sort of "equalization" of charge should something happen. Most people don't pay any attention to this. Is that good practice? Probably not.

I would recommend starting with a reputable pool builder to get your info. An electrician is likely going to stick with "grounding" and swear up and down that it's the same thing. It is not.
 
The easiest thing to check for is to look for bare copper wire connected to your heater and pool pump that wire should head from your equipment back to the pool. Bonding of in ground pools has been required by code for a very long time.

If you need more verification to ease you mind contact your local building permit office and ask them for the records of when your pool was built. Part of their inspection should include verification that bonding was done.

They should also be able to tell you who installed your pool.

Adding bonding to an IG pool after it has been built is very costly and destructive work.
 
Thanks everyone. So i went out and checked the pool equipment this morning, and I do see a copper wire (about 1/8" or so) coming out of the ground. Once out of the ground it attaches to my heater and then heads over towards my pump. BUT, it is not attached to the pump. How would I know if this is a bonding or grounding wire? When we bought the house, we had a single speed pump, but had it upgraded to a variable less than 2 years ago. I'm guessing when the guy installed it, he just didn't hook it back up. It seems like a simple fix though, all i need to do is slip the end of the wire into the rectangular mounting bracket and tighten the screw. I'll be doing that today. Will also try and pull the construction records from the County just for my own piece of mind. Thanks all!
 

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thomearl said:
It seems like a simple fix though, all i need to do is slip the end of the wire into the rectangular mounting bracket and tighten the screw. I'll be doing that today.
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Yup, that's how you do it.

While building departments can tell you dates inspections were performed, they generally don't have records of any specifics of an individual inspection. They can tell you it passes rough electrical on (insert date here) and final electrical on (insert date here). There will generally not be any notes of specifics.
 
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