GFI Tripping

[Jacuzzi Jim]

   Either would work, if it were me I would just order the whole tube and slap it in.   But not from that site.   You should be able to find the same thing for less.   120 to 170 range. 

[Botswana]

Ok I found it for 150. Right now, I was able to set up that camera and the cloud storage so I can see videos of the LEDs. If the tub is tripping during or right after heat cycle I'd be able to tell since a red LED comes on when it heats.  If it trips without a red light on I would doubt it's the heater. Regardless, gonna wait to order heater till next trip or two when I can review the video evidence. 

[bud16415]

Sounds like you have a workable trouble shooting plan with the camera. Give that a go and see what you find out.

As to the megger test you are actually testing the insulation between the heater and the metal that contains the water and eventually your earth ground. The way the insulation gets tested is by forcing a voltage on it as great or greater than it normally sees. Wire for 240v insulation is rated at 600v so there should be a safety factor. So in the case of wire shorting out you would test it with some voltage lower than 600v. you don’t want to make the item fail with the test unless it is below spec.

So say your heater normally sees 240v and is insulated for 600v as the safety factor but is breaking down slowly from water weeping or corrosion. Now it works fine at 240v but might fail at 250v. So maybe a little voltage spike will trip it once in a while. The megger test will find something that is boarderline.

Be careful with holding the probes or clamp, you want to stand back and push the button as these things will give you a good jolt. In the old days you cranked them now they have batteries and step the voltage up. 

[Botswana]

Bud -

I understand the concept of a megger, I just don't necessarily know the actual steps in conducting the test.  I would disconnect both power leads from the heater to the board and put a probe in one of them. The other line from the megger would go to the grounding bar on the heater, where the 2 pumps are also grounded, correct? The heater ground itself is screwed into the main spa board. I'm guessing so that the heater and board are tied together which is then grounded by the green wire coming out of the breaker. Are those the correct steps? Also to make sure megger is on 500v..

For pumps i would disconnect both conductors from the main board, probe one, then put the other line from the megger onto the heater ground bar where the pump ground is connected,  correct?

I'm fairly confident my neighbor did it correctly, I also just want to learn and there's no harm in testing twice.

[bud16415]

Personally I would totally isolate the device I’m testing electrically. No need to remove it from the tub. Chances are leaving the ground connected won’t harm anything as the ground should all be common and go back to earth. I just wouldn’t want 500v anyplace on the controller if I didn’t have to. Think of it as if you were trying to burn out the heater by forcing it to arc to the casing. In this case you shouldn’t put enough voltage to do that unless it is already a bad insulation. It should be good for at least 600 volts. I don’t know the exact spec the heater manufacture would test at most likely 1000v or something like that. I would feel safe testing at 500v.

You could do the same thing disconnecting the power wires on both end and megger testing between the two wires and ground. If you had a slight breakdown in the wires it would show up. That would be something like a nick or crack in the wire insulation that wouldn’t pass current normally but if they got wet then it could trip the GFCI. Remember a GFCI only needs to see I think 5ma going to ground to trip and the trip happens in one cycle of the power so it shuts you down before any melt thru could take place.

The megger does not have the current potential like the main feed has it is mostly just
Voltage. Kind of like the spark plug on your lawn mower. It is not likely to kill you but it can give quite a jolt. 

[Botswana]

Ok so it sounds like your suggesting to unscrew the heater ground going to the board and disconnect both power leads, which means the heater is literally not connected to anything via wire....and the same thing with the pumps, disconnect the ground cables from the grounding bar when testing.  Got it

Your second paragraph is a little confusing to me. You mean disconnect the wires from the spa gfi breaker and the spa board just to test the integrity of those wires running through the PVC underground?

[bud16415]

Correct.

[Botswana]

Okay, so got the first trip on camera this morning, though I'm not sure how much it tells us.  Here is what happened:

at 7:32:30AM both status LEDs were green.  The tub attempted to kick on the jets to start what I believe to be a heat cycle and it tripped instantly (about 1 second from when the PUMP LED came on).  The RED LED for heat never came on, because when it starts a heat cycle, it gets the jets going for 15 seconds before (confirmed from other videos I have) the RED LED comes on.  Now, that doesn't mean the heater isn't necessarily on in those 15 seconds and getting "warmed up" or anything, that's just purely when the red LED comes on.  I know it was NOT a filter session because it had filtered for 1.5hrs between 1:48am-3:20am and it only filters every 12 hrs. 

So...it was either the pump (pump 1 is used to heat and that was replaced a few months ago, and I have had pump 2 disconnected and it still trip even though its not used in filtering/heating), or, was it the heater clicking on and getting ramped up even though it typically takes a few seconds after the pump turns on to get the red LED going.  For what its worth, the tub had heated and filtered just fine over the past few days (on camera with the jets on and RED LED for heat).  In fact, it heated from 5:54am-6:05am this same morning just fine (so about an hour and half before it tripped).

or...could it be something else? Seems unlikely since it did it specifically when the tub attempted to start up for a cycle.  I will try to post videos of it happening tonight when I get home.  I cant do it all from my work phone and my work PC is to locked down to access the stuff.

[bud16415]

If you can find out for a fact the heat relay doesn’t come on for 15 seconds that would be good information. To me most programmers would just turn it on together unless they didn’t want the inrush on the motor to hit the same instant the heater hits. I assume there is a flow sensor that wont run the heater unless water is moving.

That’s the trouble with all this computer control of equipment it is great if you know what they are doing. They can add timers and delays wherever they want. If the heater gets directly triggered by the flow sensor then one second sounds about right. But why would they delay the LED for 15 seconds? who knows.

My gut feeling is there is nothing in the controller sometimes shorting and sometimes not. Most of the time that stuff works or it doesn’t.

Sounds like it is one of two things and logic says you have already changed one of them without changing the result.

One thing for sure when you get it fixed you will be the expert here on such problems.   

[Botswana]

Yea, just like being "voluntold" to do something at work.

I can't imagine it being pump 1 since it was replaced, and I kind of confirmed it was replaced (not rebuilt) with the sticker on the pump and the fact that it had a 2017 dated capacitor in it when its a 2016 hot tub.

When I get home I am going to try to reposition the camera (not sure if I can), because there is one more LED in the area that is on a smaller, what I believe to be, heater relay board, which is screwed into the main board.  The light is always green as long as the tub is on and doesn't turn red when heating, but its just another data point.  If I could get all LEDs in frame that would be great, there is just not a lot of real estate under there.

I think I am going to wait for another trip or two to make sure it is only happening when it attempts to heat, and not occasionally when it tries to filter.

The other thought I had was to open the cabinet and put a multimeter on the heater wires and force the tub to manually heat.  That way I could gauge by the amp reading whether it immediately tries to power up even if the red LED doesn't come on. Does that make sense?  If it does try to immediately do that, then I think it would mean my problem is the heater (also assuming it only ever trips on a heat cycle)...which would be the most ideal solution given the price and ease of swapping.

Does seem so odd that its so random of a trip and hasn't gotten any more frequent in the last year if its a heater problem, but at this stage...who the heck knows.  I do know the previous owners did not do a great job with the chemicals...it apparently sat a few months with no chemicals at all in it.  Suppose that could have caused corrosion, but it was still only a year.

Ill post back when there is more.  Thanks for the help, Bud

[bud16415]

Ya if you put a amp meter or look for voltage on the heater and then just turn the temp setting in the tub up it should force the heater to kick on. You can compare the voltage to the red lights and the pump starting. 

[Botswana]

So I did just that. Amps to heater only started when red LED went on. It was purely just the jets turning on when it tripped. Makes me think it isn't heater..but not sure what it could be now. Also confirmed pump 2 doesnt energize at all when pump 1 starts.

[Jacuzzi Jim]

 You need to just go buy a new spa.     

[Botswana]

Just spent 4k on this one last year The only possible solution at this point seems like the board, but it just doesnt make sense.  Unless somehow I got a dud pump replacement..which seems unlikely.

[bud16415]

If the heater didn’t fire yet then it has to be in the pump 1 electrics. Could be motor but you would have had to have two bad ones in a row (unlikely). Or someplace going back from that, wires, connection, whatever power relay controls pump 1 etc.