Dan.The.Spa.Man

I came across this set up the other day and thought it was particularly nice. I always have a camera with me on service calls, I keep forgetting to take pics of the more interesting set-ups that I see. I'll have to start snapping some shots to post on here.

I filled the spa through the filter compatment and it begins leaking pretty quickly and quite a bit from the back right by the precision jets. about the time the water starts coming out of them. So thats my guess. Do you think i should fill it completely and run it first to see what else happens or should i attempt to fix that major leak first then run it? I got it used from my wifes co-worker and have yet to see it run. He said it ran fine for them but it had a leak from the heater which I have replaced and nothing else is leaking in the equipment compartment. It sat outside last winter but I drained it and used a shop vac to suction out the rest. Must not have gotten all of it. Yes, I've fixed about 25 tubs or so were the precision jets froze and cracked when not blown out properly. Take the corner slats off and dig out the foam. You will most likely have to fill it and run it to see the cracks open up and water leak out from them. I would recommend fixing that first and then go from there.

I have the same spa and a leak in nearly the same spot. I went to fill it and water began running out of the front right side of it. Just to the right of the equipment compartment. I pulled of the side panel and started digging out foam. The foam was wet all the way back to the back right corner near the precision jets. I put more water in and it was streaming out from that area but couldn't dig back far enough from the side so I need to flip it on its side and dig from the bottom. I'm wondering if it could be leaking from around the air diverters? Seems to be wet near those areas? The water drains out very quickly when filled and stops just under the lowest jet in the foot well but does not drain completely out. Not sure were to look. Has this spa been sitting unused in an area where temps get below freezing? If you start to fill the tub and water starts pouring out it sounds like it froze.

Thanks Dan. Likewise, regarding my previous thread which you have referenced above, I recall feeling how you would not be the type of dealer I would be interested in buying from either. This too is just an honest opinion, no disrespect. Funny thing though, EVERY single dealership I went into here in Calgary was very interested in having my business, and were even kind enough to allow me to put deposits down - just to help me with my purchase. I guess your dealership would be quite unique here in the Calgary market. I have never - ever- had a business dealing like this. Be it houses, cars, stereos, TVs, hockey equipment or even cheeseburgers - I have never once been treated like I was by this dealership. I grew up in an era where there used to be a saying, "the customer is always right", however, it seems more and more that in the hot tub industry, this edict has been replaced with "there's a sucker born every minute." Perhaps this could spawn the birth of a new, retail-oriented phrase "disposable customers." Definition - say whatever you can to make the sale, ignore them and blow them off afterwards, and then in the small minority of cases where a customer becomes overly bothersome (ie. actually expects defects to be repaired and attempts to hold you accountable), simply give them their money back and flog the product on the next unsuspecting and hopefully more docile sucker. This certainly is easier that honesty, integrity, and commitment and will avoid all those money-losing warranty repairs. After all, we are still in a recession! You can call me unreasonable if you will, however you are not qualified to make that statement. Although we all have different levels of what we deem as acceptable and reasonable, consumers DO have certain rights, and some dealers clearly, for whatever reasons, would prefer to not deal with customers who insist those rights be upheld. If you at all act in "real life" like you portray yourself on here, then I guarantee that if you were in my shoes, you would have felt/acted the same way - if not worse. All I care about is that I am now very happy with our new tub and our new dealer, and they too are happy to have our business (at least they haven't sent the crane out yet). This thread was not meant to polarize dealers on here (be it hot tubs, motorcycles, whatever....) against all us lowly customers who dare to be unhappy and vocal about the way they have been treated, but that seems to be the way this forum goes. I was simply posting to help others who may be on here doing some research and perhaps considering dealing with Jacuzzi Calgary, and let them know about our experience, so they can make an informed decision. Anyway, thanks again for your feedback. Wannago, the 4-5 people that we decided not to sell to and the 3 tubs that we took back is out of 5000+ sales just to give you some perspective. So don't make me out to be like the Soup Nazi in the Seinfeld episode. Out of the 3 that we took back: One person became afraid when his 2 year old son put his foot near the area where the heat discharges and said it burned him. He asked if we would take the tub back and we did. The second guy lost his job shortly after buying the tub, asked if we would take it back, and we did. The third person was so ridiculously unreasonable that we decided that it made better business sense to take the tub back then to continue the relationship. One of the guys that we didn't sell to was a real beauty. I think he came in 25 times for what seemed like a total of 100 hours. Some of our customers thought he worked there. I don't mind people doing reasearch but this guy was unvelieveable. Tried to get us to work some sort of insurance scam (which of course we laughed at). There are about 25 more good stories but I'll get to the end.... He finally bought a tub and came in the day before to ask about 600 more questions. We had 7-8 tubs going out the next day and one of our employees had them all lined up on the far side of the building to get them ready with lifters, ozonators, etc... He asked casually if his tub was one of the ones over there...which it indeed was. After he walked out the door, we all kind of joked "why are we selling this guy a tub?" Well, one of the guys had gone out back and came around the side where the tubs were and noticed the customer pulled over near the tubs with his hood open to his truck. After he left we went over there and he had taken grease from his engine and smeared it all over the shell and back-side of the cabinet of his own tub. I', guessing he was going to ask for a discount or something when they delivered it.....which we never did. Again, good luck with your tub and hope you enjoy it.

Do you know a good source for parts? Will anything come apart? (Will I have to replace everything including the jets?) Is there a single spot were you can definitely see the water coming from and is it easily accessible? If so you can use the Devcon epoxy that I described. No reason to use a fix a leak product when you actually know where the water is coming from. If you want to replace the jets then I have found it much easier to replace the whole series of jets then to cut out the bad fitting and try to couple in to it. There simply just isn't enough room there to do it. If you see where the glue joint is leaking, the easiest repair is to use an adhesive to fix it.

If you can get the area around where it is leaking completely clean and it is easily accessible you can use an epoxy type material to seal the glue joint leak. The only thing I would recommend is Aquabond (brand name) or the devcon epoxy that Watkins sells (HotSpring). I have used these materials probably 600 times over the last ten years with no problems. There may be others that work but I have seen many people come into the store with parts in their hand that have "insert brand name here" gooped up around a crack or glue joint and it didn't work. The only other way would be to replace the set of fittings that are leaking. Due to the close proximity of the jets in the picture, it is easier to replace the tee, 90 degree elbow, and both of those jets all together.

In my line of business we call it a PITA........ Pain In The Ass There is a point at which you realize that no matter what you do the customer will never be satisfied. At that point it is by definition a "no win" situation. It is better to "divorce" the customer than put up with the continued work load that serving them would put on the business. At the same time, no matter what you do, or how good your intentions as a business, it will just continue to make the situation worse. I have bought back $25,000 motorcycles just to get the monkey off my back. I am not saying it's Wannago's fault, sometimes it just happens. It can be as simple as the customer and the salesperson both having a bad day, then people get upset, and plant their feet on both sides...and viola! I will say though that by virtue of your extremely long post about this that you have very clear and precise expectations for your purchase, this by definition can make it very hard for a business to make things right by you. anyways....pretty cool that you got your money back. Good for you! I couldn't agree more. One thing I've learned in this business is that there is definitely two sides to every story and the truth usually lies in the middle somewhere. Wannago, for all I know and for the point of this argument, I will assume you are 100% correct in how you describe the situation that has transpired. With that said, when you came on here with your "city dealer VS country dealer thread a few months ago...I honestly said to myself "I don't think I would sell this person a hot tub". Just an honest instinct that I had, no disrespect. I think we have decided 4-5 times over the years to just not sell tubs to people for one reason or another and have picked up 2 or 3 tubs and refunded money to customers who were unreasonable or unhappy with the tub for whatever reason. With that said everyone sounds happy and it seems like you got a great tub...hope you enjoy it.

Whoever the retailer is that told you this is ripping you off. There is no reason to replace the whole IQ 2020 if the heater board is bad under normal circumstances. 99.5% of the time it is just the heater board.

I was confused by that a little as well. I think lkneisler meant that there was power going to the leads for the short time that the red "heater on" light was lit but then the light goes off the voltage drops off as well. Definitely make sure that you replaced both thermistors, there really isn't much more to it. After that, yes, the control head or the IQ box. But that would be pretty rare to have to replace those parts for a heater light not coming on.

I believe that's the one I replaced. There are two, right? One is hi-limit the other is the temp (or control) thermister? I should replace the other one anyway. I had the temp at 101 then 104. And the water is fresh so FREEZING! Thanks for the info about showing the actual temp. I'll have to try that out. Always so annoying not being able to see the actual temp. Right now the spa is all apart waiting for a new heater relay board. When that's done I'll continue this most wonderful hair pulling experience. Someone mentioned the control head might be a problem. Is the summer timer option on? It will show a sundial/timer looking icon on the control panel. If so the circ pump will shut off shortly after resetting the breaker as will the heater. If the summer timer is on it will take quite a while for a 110volt tub to heat up.

Tub was made in the 2nd quarter of '97

That's all they told you? The loose hose most likely came from the ozone check valve. the other end probably has the valve on it and is somewhere up higher in the motor compartment. The hose draws air when the tub is on, so it won't leak until you turn it off.

I really wouldn't pay more than $3500 of so for a tub that is more than 4-5 years old. The other problem is that HotSpring stopped making the Landmark model in 2003. So the price and info sounds sketchy already. Find out the serial number and post it and we can figure out the year.

You do not have to drain to make those replacements. Your symptoms are strange. I would take the circ pump filter out and see if it heats. If so, that is the issue. Make sure there is no debris to get sucked into the pump. Where is this filter located? thanks The filter that has the gray cap/stand pipe out of the 5 main filters. If it was due to a dirty filter though, you would probably have a problem with the high-limit tripping on the heater. First, are you sure the thermometer is accurate? Many times the cheap pool thermometers are wrong and the tub is actually at the right temp. If the temp is off, then you may want to replace the control thermistor or both thermistors (hi-limit as well). They are the two things that screw into the heater end and have wires that connect to the side of the control box. When I replace them I usually just kill power, unscrew the old ones, quickly put my thumb over the hole, and screw in the new one. Make sure that the o'ring either stays in the hole or if if comes out pop it on the new thermistor before screwing it in. You can crimp off the lines with small needle-nosed vise grips if you want to do that instead.

Dan, The neutral (white wire) is connected to the "load neutral" on the center of the 20 amp gfci. and it is connected to the #5 on the terminal block. There is no lead from the neutral bus bar to the neutral on the control box. I have a ground rod at the sub panel and it is connected to a sep ground bus. I have a ground wire from that bus to the ground lug in the control panel. I also have a ground rod by the tub and a ground wire from that rod to the the bus on the left outer part of the control box. I have a ground wire from the ground bus of the sub panel to the neutral/ground bus in the feeder panel. (Could this be causing the problem?) The load leads for the 20 amp GFCI are connected to #1 and #3. The load leads for the 30 amp (plain breaker) are connected to #2 and #4 Other wires in the smaller contol board are for the heater. This is the newer heater contol board and I removed the spade connectors and put one wire into the H1 term and the other into the H2 holders and then the green ground wire I screwed to the ground between the 2 terminal blocks. All this is powered from a sub panel in my garage that is fed from my main panel on the other side of the house. The panel inside the garage has one 50 amp GFCI and 1 other circuit right now that powers a freezer. I fed the outside sub panel with all 3 leads from the 50 GFCI and then put a ground from the neutral/ground bus on the inside to the ground bus on the outside panel. (the outside has 2 bus bars, one for neutral and the other for grounds. The ground bus has 3 wires on it. one from the outside ground rod. one to the contol box and the other to the inside feeder box. The neutral bus has one from the feeder 50 gfci and one to the 20 Amp gfci in the same sub panel. Thanks again all, Let me know what else to look for. Im sure its something simple, just not sure what. Don On the 2002 the neutral wire on the #5 terminal is supposed to be connected to the load neutral on the 30 amp breaker, not the 20.

Sounds like the wiring is messed up. Pics would help. Make sure that the white wire that connects to terminal #5 in the control box is hooked up to the neutral of the gfci breaker (I think the 30 but make sure on the diagram) and not connected to the bus bar in the sub-panel.

That tub is a 1995. You may also want to look for small cracks in the shell around the lens and the "step" above it. The cracks would look like small black hairs, but you can feel them with your fingernail. The lens is easy enough to replace, hopefully it's just that. Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Lets start with the year of the tub or a serial number if you don't know. This could help us mention some of the common problems with certain years. As far as where the water is coming from, unfortunately, with the amount of time that you have been experiencing a leak, the foam of the tub is more than likely saturated. Because of this the water will start seeping out at the lowest point possible. It is probably coming up into the motor compartment from the screw holes where the jet pump bolts to the floor, or the small holes where the various bleedlines exit through the floor.

Are you sure it's 86 degrees? Just making sure...I've had people tell me their tub was 65 degrees because the thermometer said so even thought it was 102. If so, I would suspect the t-stat. Like you suggested, you may need to test the amperage and do some metering.

Do you mean that the air control valve is not working? Sometimes it lets air into the jets and sometimes it doesn't? If so, there is a sleeve on the inside of the valve that is probably malfunctioning. I don't have the part number right now but you can replace the air control valve assembly if that is your problem.

Sounds like your heater is bad. It may still have 14 ohms for continuity, but current is leaking out to ground, which causes the GFCI to trip. With the power off, test between one terminal on the heater and one to ground. It should read "open line (O.L.)" or zero. If you get any other value then it is bad.

Is it wet near the seat with the bank of 10 small "Precision" jets? If so you may have some glue joint leaks there.

Are there 3 small flashing dots under the temp reading on the control panel? If so, you may need a new pressure switch or your filter may be dirty.

No, the flashing power light has nothing to do with the spa being level. Your most likely problem is an air-bound, clogged, or dead circulation pump. You need to verify that the small circulation pump is running.

It's not price gouging if you don't need the item and/or you can get it cheaper somewhere else. Wannago...can you find out how long both of these dealers have been in business?...just curious. Also, you really think Burger King B would give you a complete order for free because Burger King A two hours away screwed up your order?