Ask Me Help Desk - Hot tub gfci trips

Hot tub gfci trips

I'm about to pull my hair out... Gfci on hot tub trips as soon as breaker in main panel is turned on... replaced breaker with new 50 amp gfi... replaced wires from gfi box to tub... unhooked all plugs on control box... it even trips if you unhook the main hot wires to the tub... with only the nutral hooked up to the tub...
If you unhook the white gfi nutral the tub runs fine... this makes no sense to me what so ever... PLEASE HELP!!

Is this a new or existing installation?

Have you wired LOAD NEUTRAL only to the hot tub and the pigtail only to the Hot tub Panel?

Are you sharing a neutral with something else?

Yes... it trips with only the nutral hooked up and no power at all out at the tub... No I am not sharing a nutral... It is on it's own circuit

It is a new installation but a used tub

On the GFI breaker, there are 3 terminals + a pigtail. Correct?

The pigtailed wire must go to the breaker box. Nothing else.

Load Neutral, which should be a terminal on the GFCI breaker, goes to all the hot tub circuits.

Here is a SPA disconnect. Note that Load neutral and panel neutral positions.

Wiring a Hot Tub - Electrical Installation and Wiring Diagrams

This may help too:
http://ts.nist.gov/Standards/Global/upload/gannon.ppt

Correct... and everything is hooked up as you say and correctly... tub nutral to center termenal on gfi... marked load nutral... white pigtail on gfi to nutral bus in box

This is getting difficult.

In your panel, you have run 4 wires to the SPA panel, correct?
Black, red, white and gnd.

GFI's will protect against, reverse polarity (e.g. a neutral and a hot switched)
A shared neutral.
A Hot1-Hot2+N > ~6mA.

With the load wires removed from the GFCI, it should not be able to trip and you claim it does.

With that information at hand, I'll have to ask the following:

Is it possible that a hot and neutral are mixed up?

Does the wiring from the SPA panel go to a main panel or does it go to a sub-panel before the SPA panel?

I'm almost getting ready to suggest posting a picture using "go advanced" of the SPA panel connections and the main panel connections.

Sorry, but if it wasn't difficult I wouldn't be asking!!

Actually it is 3 wire... wires are color coded and in the proper places, and although I can't figure how either, it does trip with only the nutral to tub hooked up!!

Wires run from spa control panel to siemens 240 V gfci panel then to a 50 amp breaker in the breaker/disconect panel for the house...

Sorry I don't have a digital camera to take pictures with

3 wires mean: Hot 1, Hot 2 and ground.

But guess what, the GFCI breaker needs the pigtail neutral to function. Load neutral is optional.

So, you need to get 4 wires out to the GFCI panel OR put a GFCI breaker in the main panel. Then have a 3 wire feed to tub.

Those are the only two solutions that I know of. In both cases the GFCI MUST have it's LINE neutral CONNECTED, but it's LOAD neutral can be left unconnected.

It's OK to not use LOAD neutral, but LINE neutral MUST be connected.

So if I install an earth ground to the gfi panel are you saying it should work properly??

Or a ground wire from the main breaker box for the house?. As I'm sure you know the ground and neutral are bonded in the house disconect box... so I don't really understand how running another wire from there would sooth the gfi's mind any at all...

Let's try again. Yes, ground and neutral are connected at the main panel. We agree on this.

Ground carries no current but in a fault condition. Do we agree on this?

Neutral carries the difference of the currents in the two hot wires. So if L1 is 10 A and L2 id 12 A, Neutral carries 2 A (sign matters).

It can be arranged that I(L1) - I(L2) + I(N) = 0 unless there is a ground fault. This can be done by the direction the wires are wound on a torroid.

That out of the way.

That 240 GFCI breaker needs some power to do it's measuring and detection thing. That power comes from the pigtail. This power for the breaker to do it's thing cannot be seen by I(N) above, otherwise the breaker will instantly trip.

The GFCI will also detect shorted neutrals and grounds after the GFCI.

I'll use a 120 V GFCI, because it's easier to see. Suppose that L1 and N's current subtract to have a result of zero current. Now suppose we introduce a high frequency AC voltage superimposed on both the neutral and the hot. They will cancel, correct?

If Neutral is shorted to ground after the GFCI, then the AC voltage introduced intensionally in the neutral will not cancel anymore because the one on the neutral lead will be non-existant. This check, checks for shorted neutrals.

So, the GFCI breaker needs power (120 V) to operate and that upsets the balance unless the pigtail is used. It also knows if the neutral and the ground are connected downstream.

I have everything hooked up according to wiring diag.Four conductors from main panel to spa disconnect white and ground connected to gnd Black and red to breakers. In disconnect black to bus leading to one breaker and red connected to bus for other breaker, white is connected to pigtail and gnd to gnd bus. With spa disconnected gfi trips with spa connected spa trips. It trips with no wires connected to load side of breakers, Going crazy

Disconnecting at tub should be the same as disconnecting at the Load Side of the GFI Breaker. See if it trips. then hook back to breaker and disconnect at spa, If there is a difference, you have a problem with wiring between your GFI and SPA.
Once you can turn on the GFI with Wire disconnected at SPA, Reconnect, Then unplug, if your unit is like this(seperate plug ins for Pumps, Blower, Lights and other accessories).
Try to reset, then plugin connectors from blower, pumps, etc,1 by 1. and see which is giving a problem.

1 Attachment(s)

I think this may be the problem:

Quote:

white is connected to pigtail

The load white must connect to a silver colored terminal lub on the GFI breaker, usually below where the pigtail wire exits the breaker.

The pigtail then connect to the neutral bar in the disconnect, which will then connect it to the Line white neutral.

Hey TK, The Detail shows the Neutral Connection, Yet the Larger Drawing doesn't show the Loads Neutral?
Great Diagram.

"white and ground connected to gnd"

Neutral and ground can only connect at the main service panel.

If you have Neutral (White) and Ground connected to the "Ground Bus", that is your failure point.

I fixed my problem turned out the GFI was bad the source poles were shorted together. Everything works fine now.

Buy 240v-50 gfci receptacle and install it beneath the bath.
You can troubleshoot the hot-tub first to see it has no ground fault . Do this with ohmmeter .check out if there is continuity between hot terminals and neutral,hot terminals and ground. If there is not then I will assume the hot tub is good.
You can now install you gcfi and plug in you hottub . I have done that in 2008 in DC.

A 50 Amp GFI receptacle?

Can you provide a make and model number of one of these units?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Josh__7

buy 240v-50 gfci receptacle and install it beneath the bath.

Really? :confused:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Josh__7

You can troubleshoot the hot-tub first to see it has no ground fault . Do this with ohmmeter .check out if there is continuity between hot terminals and neutral,hot terminals and ground. if there is not then I will assume the hot tub is good.

How would they prevent getting a reading through a load, such as a motor?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Josh__7

You can now install you gcfi and plug in you hottub . I have done that in 2008 in DC.

Pictures would be lovely. :cool: