We took delivery of our 04 SA Euphoria last Friday. Final electrical hookup will be Tuesday. Our wall/pavestone contractor had a schedule change and moved up the completion of our pad and walls by two weeks. So we were able to move up the spa delivery in front of our electrical appointment.
Our issues/questions:
First off, we love the shell color -- Antique Bronze -- very beautiful in our Arizona sunshine. However, we selected a charcoal cover and the driftwood (grey) durabase cabinet. In the dealer showroom, we thought these would look good in our yard, but instead the greys really stand out and contrast too much with all of the earthtones (our house is surrounded by open desert). The spa cover was an easy fix. We called our wonderful dealer and simply switched the charcoal cover for the wildwood (brown) cover. The wildwood cover looks great and blends well into our surroundings.
The cabinet color is more problematic. In the sunlight, the driftwood is more bright and reflective of light than we prefer (almost looking near white in sunlight). Since we used 8 men to get the spa into its location -- two from the spa dealer, 5 from the pavestone crew and myself -- switching out the spa for a different cabinet color is not a great option due to the difficult logistics of getting the spa in and out of its location. We have two ideas to solve our issue:
1) properly prime and paint the durabase cabinet to match the earthtone (light brown) retaining walls that surround the spa on two sides and are prelevant throughout our rear yard, or
2) see if the dealer will allow us to unscrew the driftwood durabase cabinet, switch for the cedar durabase, then reinstall the cedar durabase cabinet. This will save us from having to physically move the spa again.
If we knew the durabase would receive and hold paint well, our preference would be to paint the durabase to match the spas surroundings perfectly. The cedar durabase will be better than the driftwood, but still not exactly what we would like.
Questions:
1) Has anyone heard of anyone painting the durabase and with what results?
2) Can the entire cabinet easily be switched by simply removing a few screws?
3) Can the shiplap cedar (real wood) cabinet be reinstalled in place of the durabase? I presume the real wood cabinet would be more conducive to painting.
Ideally, we would like to end up with a durabase cabinet painted in exactly the shade of our choosing. This would give us the color that we want and the lower maintenance (aside from paint touch up) and longevity of the durabase. The AZ sun can be brutal on wood and I believe the durabase will stand up better to our elements. Please correct me if I am off base on this belief.
We brought our equipment cover panel into a local Sherwin Williams store to get their opinion on how well primer and paint would adhere to the durabase. The staff felt that everything would be ok, but would not guarantee with 100% certainty that the paint would not present a maintenence issue. I have various sorts of conduit and other types of plastic items (sprinkler timer, for instance) that are above ground and attached to the house that I have painted to match the house color with good and lasting results. This makes me lean towards believing that painting the durabase will work fairly well. Our dealer has not heard of anyone that has painted the durabase cabinet. We have not yet posed the cabinet switching questions to our dealer because our preferred solution is to paint and we don't want to torture the man any more than is necessary.
We are excited to get tubbing, but we are patient and want to get everything just right before we push the tub against the walls and fill her up.
Comments from the experts please.