Todd C.

Hello Meth, I will give you my 3 year old pool story. I live in the Raleigh, NC area and my son (13 at the time)and I installed our inground vinyl lined pool. I purchased a kit from Polar pools (www.polarpools.com) for about $7K and picked it up at the FedEx depot here in town. The shape is Deer Creek and it is about 18,000 gallons. It wasn't a steel wall but rather a thermo plastic wall type. It came with all of the required items needed to install a basic pool. It had a DVD with instructions that covered the entire installation. This is the bullet list of tasks: 1. Got permits from the town & called Miss Utility 2. Laid out my pool area with marking paint. Also determined where my filter and pump were going to go. 3. Rented a backhoe and started digging. You need to ensure you have a place to put the dirt you are removing. You will use it to backfill. My son was excellent at digging the hole because he said the controls were just like his Xbox. 4. Tamped & smoothed the pool area out to accept the pool walls. 5. Once leveled, I bolted all of the walls together and installed the preformed steps. 6. When the walls were all done I bonded all of the metal coping, step rails and anything with metal. At this point I had an electrical inspection for all of the bonding. 7. I ran all of the plumbing lines; used 1 1/2 pipe for the suction and return lines, installed 2 skimmers. Also wired the Hayward pump and salt generator. (Picked up the salt system on ebay brand new for $600). Wired the pool light also. 8. Poured concrete around the outside walls before I backfilled. 9. Backfilled the entire pool area. 10. For the bottom of the pool I used Pool Crete. Real easy to use and gives a nice bottom for the liner to rest on. 11. Installed the liner. Very intimidating but I was able to get through it. 12. Filled the pool. 13. My wife found a great sale at Lowes on paver block so I did that instead of concrete. This is the 3rd year of operation and I am very pleased with the pool. I do love the salt system and I have no trouble with keeping the pool balanced and it is always crystal clear. I have had some issues but it has been worth it. My 3 kids think so. Last year I added a heat pump and I keep the water around 75 degrees from April to the end of September. I also put a slide in last year and added a auto pool cleaner. The pool cleaner is my only real disappointment so far, it is a Hayward Phantom. My total cost for the pool kit, decking, heater, slide, cleaner, equipment rental and misc is $18K. Feel free to ask me any detailed questions and I hope this helps. Best regards. Todd C.

I do understand the wire gauge issue and what size is needed to run the different circuits. My question is can you have a 20 amp double pole breaker as a branch circuit off of a subpanel with a 50 amp GFCI main. The 20 amp circuit will be run with 12/3 and I am thinking the pump is protected, ground fault wise, by the GFCI in the subpanel.

Hello All, I am in the process of adding a Hayward booster pump to my existing system. I currently have a hardwired 220v 15 amp GFI breaker that feeds the main pump and salt generator (total of 9 amps draw). The new pump and the existing units would be a 15amp draw. I was plannning on installing a 20amp GFI 220v breaker but they are about $150 in my area. I do have a 50amp GFI spa panel with 2 slots I could use instead. My question is can I run a standard double pole 20amp breaker off of the 50amp GFI to power the 2 pumps and still be protected and within code compliance? It seems to me that I would be ok. Any thoughts are appreciated. Todd C.