Shaamus

Doc's right, the covers for Hydro were made by Prestige Spa Covers which is owned by one of the Wiley brothers. From what I saw of those covers at my local Costco, two years is about what I would guess you would get.

Unless you're adding a new "service", a subpanel is only going to give you more room, not more amps. A 125A subpanel connected to a 200A main panel isn't going to give you 325A, you'll still only have 200A. Now, I do agree that a subpanel is the cleanest and safest way to do what you want to do, but if this is more about amps than space you need to have your service upgraded.

I have to agree with Doc. I have no problem with Hydro trying to reinvent itself, but takes a lot of gall to try and blame the lack of warranty execution on the component vendors that weren't even paid for the parts in the first place.

To be fair, Infinity is not Hydro Spa. Whereas it is appropriate to discuss the potential failings of their insulation system, I don't think Infinity deserves to be lumped in with the other mass-merchandiser manufacturers. I haven't heard that dealing with Infinity has been difficult. In fact, a lot of spa service techs that buy covers from us have said that Infinity has been easy to work with.

Just flip the foam cores over. It should solve your problem. If doing so allows steam to escape from the middle of that side instead of corners, then the foam core is too bowed to be used and you should consult your dealer about obtaining a warranty replacement. Unfortunately, as Doc alluded to, spa cover manufacturers can't reject everything but perfectly flat, non-bowed board. The costs of the foam (due to scrap costs) would skyrocket. The key is to put the bow going down so two things happen: 1) gravity will pull the bow down over time and 2) if a bow remains, the water will still run off. Now if the bow is so pronounced that a gap in the middle of the run is formed, then it must not be used. However, most bowing is very slight and can be used as long as the core is rotated properly. In all likelihood, flipping your foam core over will solve the problem. It just should have been done at the factory. If you don't want to do it, ask the dealer to send a tech out to do it. It is literally a 5 minute job.

Richard, We sell a lot of Nature2 and are big proponents of it, but I completely agree with your assessment. They got the EPA on board with a system that technically follows the rules but isn't as good as the old recipe of dosing with chlorine and shocking with MPS. We still push the old system. It's easier to understand, especially for previous chlorine only users since you are basically adding the N2 stick and using less chlorine. The bottom line is they are trying to reach the people that want a chlorine/bromine free solution. The problem is that it doesn't exist if you really want your water sanitized. We sell a lot of ecoONE too and Pacific Sands even pushes the dichlor. In the effort to get the "alternative spa care" customers, they're stretching the details a bit. But honestly, it can probably be said that they "low chlorine recipe" is a lot better than most of that crap that passes itself off as safe alternative spa water care. I just wish the Zodiac marketing department weren't taking such liberties with the fine details. You should also notice that Zodiac markets an MPS product (Cense - it's a nice product with aromatherapy built in). Nature2 is great. Just dose with dichlor and shock with MPS.

Not sure why carpenter is talking about the lack of solar benefits. Why would anyone think they would get the "solar" benefits? The main cover is usually closed. It's about vapor reduction pure and simple. Also, there's a lot of empirical evidence showing that they work. Yes, they are worth the trouble in this spa cover manufacturer's opinion.

There is no chlorine tab that should be used in a spa. The tabs/sticks are usually tri-chlor and that's a no-no in a spa due to its concentration. Chem Geek has posted about this over in the chemistry forum. Y'all can do a search on the subject and let that subject die. As for the off-brands. Some are good. Some aren't as good. The problem is no-one really knows because outside of Chem Geek, who pulls MSDS sheets when looking at a particular chemical. Who else can really read them? This goes deeper than where's it made or what's in it. This is about dealer vs. internet vs. mass merchandiser vs. consumer looking to get away with the cheapest thing out there that gets the job done. The fact is Leisure Time and the other brand-name lines are very good. They take a whole view approach to their line and adjust the chems accordingly. An example is their Renew non-chlorine shock. They add buffers to it. Many cheaper shock products are just 100% Oxone MPS. The reason Leisure Time adds the buffers is because MPS has a tendency to drop pH. If you have high pH anyway, then use the cheaper 100% MPS, but LT adds the buffers to make Renew as pH neutral as possible. We sell both Leisure Time and an off-brand, Spa Choice. To my knowledge, outside of the shock, the product lines are very similar in construction. We have good prices on both lines, but the Spa Choice is a little cheaper. I chalk it up to paying for Leisure Time's R&D and advertising. Despite the higher prices, we sell 4x more of it than the Spa Choice. It just works and people seem to like it. Like others have said, the mass merchants are buying from the same suppliers that private label for individual stores in some cases. Dealers don't tell their customers that the bottle in their showroom with their name on it is horrible compared to the brand-name product because they know it's not. All this said, thestallion brings up a good point in that you really don't know what's in it. But those of you buying from a mass merchant paying 20-35% lower prices isn't going to take a dealer's word for it. My advice is to try it. If it works for you, great... you're saving money. But also give the brand-names their due, they do make a great product and are "in the business of spa chemisty". What I mean by that is they are doing the R&D and introducing the products, taking the risks. The mass merchants are selling the old-standbys. Eventually if you put the innovators out of business by buying the cheap knockoffs, no one will be around to invent the next great product. Lowes and Walmart aren't in the product creation business and I think a lot of people forget that part of our economy.

Loose fitting vinyl cover combined with not enough drain holes. Water gets trapped, heat is softening the underside vinyl scrim allowing it to stretch. Welcome to most OEM spa covers. They're built to a price, not a quality level. Make sure you are completely removing the cover at least once every couple weeks to allow it to drain completely.

Someone's been hitting the spiked holiday eggnog a bit early this year. Please do your research before you buy the Spa Cap. In SoCal it may not be as big a deal, but those energy-efficiency numbers that Jeff puts out there are stretches to be kind. Dr. Spa has a file on the Spa Crap. Maybe he'll chime in. Just to be fair, I do own a company that builds spa and hot tub covers.

The service guys that I sell to love when people buy the mass-merchandiser tubs. They stay busy fixing them.

Good luck finding anyone (replacement manufacturer) willing to make that for you the standard way, much less reversed. I have advised my Jacuzzi dealers that we would not be supporting that tub and that they should order those covers from Jacuzzi. That is a great tub with the exception of that boneheaded design. When a cover does not rest flat on a spa, it doesn't seal properly. I was considering this tub for myself until I got a look at the cover. I rank this one up there with the older-style speaker spas.

weak ammonia and water or bleach and water solution

I'm a cover manufacturer and we do sell the replacement kits like Hot Spring does. Terminator is correct in that that is the way to install them. However, at least take a look locally at an upholstery/cut-n-sew shop. It really needs to be sewn back on and it may be worth the small investment. For local customers, we usually charge around $15-$25 including new hardware depending on how many clips are broken. I don't see why a local shop would turn down a quick twenty bucks for a 20 minute job.

Like others have mentioned, don't get rid of your new cover until you have to. A floating blanket will help out, but your big problem is the insulation around the shell. Thermalpane insulation, unless done perfectly, needs a little help. Just do a search on this forum for some ideas.

Technically, if you follow the patent royalties being paid, the Covermate 3 is a copy of the Cover Valet. Don't get me wrong, they are different lifts but the Valet came first and has the patent.

Arctic is the only one I know of that does this. The reason is cost. As a manufacturer of spa covers, I take my hat off to Arctic for doing what most spa manufacturers don't do: put money into the original cover making it not horrible. In Arctic's case, it's a great cover. Their castcore foam doesn't absorb water and wrapping in Mylar does improve the energy-efficiency. Considering they pay more than double for a China-made product than they could for the low-end-specc'd cover found domestically, Arctic goes the extra mile and provides a nice cover with the spa.

You can get extruded foam tapered. You just have to buy a WHOLE LOT OF IT to get the extruders to do it and no spa cover manufacturer can put together that kind of buying power for an upgraded product. The older design that a certain manufacturer tried was to use a 2in flat XPS under a 2x0 tapered EPS core which yielded the 4x2. What they found is as Doc pointed out: under the conditions that a spa faces (water vapor not water in liquid form) the XPS absorbs water too. Not quite as much, but enough that it sure as hell isn't worth 4x the price. Unfortunately the manufacturer that hung his hat (and his anti-water-absorption warranty) on XPS foam has since gone out of business under the burden of replacing foam cores for free. We (spa cover manufacturers) use foam as the core of spa covers because it is extremely strong and energy-efficient as an insulator compared to it's weight. I know some of you out there think it's so we can just make a lot more money on repeat business, but think about how much a 4x8 piece of plywood weighs and how much insulation value it brings to the table. The unfortunate fact is that EPS and XPS foam absorbs water. There is no way to get around that fact. You can create a "protective layering system" around the foam core to delay the water absorption, but because we have to put chemicals into the spa to purify the water, that layering system will eventually fail. Sure, there are technologies out these (baked on PVC coating, etc) that will render the core inpervious to water absorption but it will also render your wallet of all its cash. The material is expensive, the equipment is expensive, the process is labor-intensive which is expensive. You get the point. Bottom line is spa covers that retail up to $600 will get fully-saturated at some point. How long that takes is a function of how many and how good are the layers between the water and the foam. If someone is trying to sell you a cover and they claim to have some new technology to guarantee no water absorption and the price point is $300, they're lying to you plain and simple. 7 year water absorption warranties are designed for people that don't realize that the cost of executing that warranty seven years later is not worth the trouble (warranties on covers hardly ever cover freight). These snake-oil salesman (I have a particular internet seller in mind) have no soul and lie through their teeth about spec and warranty and expected performance and people flock to them because they're cheap, they tell you it's 2# foam when it's really 1# and they offer rediculously long warranties that aren't even spelled out on their website. It's crazy. We've been doing this for 25 years. We wrap our foam cores in a 6mil polyethylene blend and seal it on a $22000 computer-controlled pneumatic impulse sealer that puts a 1/4" weld on all the seams and guess what? It's still eventually going to absorb water. Sorry this turned into a rant, but the sooner people at least accept the fact that spa covers at the normal price-points are eventually going to get fully saturated, the sooner innocent consumers that don't know any better don't get taken by a long warranty and empty promises of performance. I'd mention the "air cover", but I'm on work/vacation here at the Pool and Spa Show and my wife says I don't have time to stay on my soap box any longer.

Yes, you do drill into metal plates put there by the factory. The part about rain getting in is Not true. I have sold them for years with no problems. Ask any HotSpring or Caldera dealer - they are the same lifters. Is it possible they don't use the Caldera covers, and the ones they do use don't have those plates? This is rec warehouse we are talking about! It's very possible that Rec Warehouse isn't supplying Caldera covers for after-market sales and you need those plates for that lifter. The built-in cover lifter that Watkins has is very nice, but keep in mind that it will lock you into a Watkins cover for as long as you want to use that lifter.

There are technologies out there that would allow us to build the 10 year cover. The problem is the cost. It is literally cheaper for an end-user to purchase 2-3 standard covers than pay for a cover that would last a long time and they get the same net result without having to front all the cash. Doc's right. We do install vapor barriers around the foam cores, but the chemicals gassing off your spa break them down over time. Chas's tips are right on about maintenance and chemical use. And when purchasing your next cover, keep these things in mind: 1) Denser foam can't absorb as much water so buy as dense as you can afford and 2) more [multi-wrapped foam cores] and better [look at mil thickness of the plastic] layers delay water absorption.

Have you ever used a spa flush/maintenance product like Leisure Time Enzyme, Spa Perfect, or Spa System Flush? You might have a bunch of junk in the pipes. Also, you might try switching to dichlor for a water change or using more MPS while shocking. How much Renew were you shocking with and how often?

It doesn't take 20k lines of code to run a Balboa pack. I've heard that most of the manufacturers code are in the new Balboa packs and they're using dip switches to select. I think what you're forgetting is that you don't have the same equipment in a Sundance or Artesian or whatever that may be in a Cal Spa so enabling the Cal code on your Sundance isn't necessarily going to get you anything. Also, it's not about features as much as it is how that spa is designed to work. Balboa does it to simplify their manufacturing. I really don't think it's like Verizon blocking out the OBEX Bluetooth code so they can make money on their Get-It-Now crap.

how much is the VAT? I knew Europe was more expensive for hot tubs, but if the going rate is double and it's not all VAT, what are we doing selling here? I hear Holland is nice.

My personal opinion is that any "rating body" that doesn't tell you who they are should be dismissed. This could be a spa manufacturer or one guy putting out his opinion on how tubs look from their websites. Either way, you'll never know because they are pretty vague on who poolandsparatings.com is. I think you'll have better luck ignoring all the online "ratings websites" and focusing on experiences of users on forums like this and teh dependability (i.e. BBB rating) of the dealer you are going to buy the tub from.

Believe it or not, shipping is not as much as you would think. It's not horrible. I would be interested to see what currency those prices are in and whether the VAT is in there (if it's not, then WOW). Like GG72 mentioned, the USD is pretty weak right now. If buying direct from a US dealer, someone paying with euros would be buying pretty cheap considering a euro is buying around 1.44 USD right now. Right now, the pound is buying about 2.08 USD.