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KE4NYV

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    Greenbackville, VA
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    Electronics, Amateur Radio, N Scale Model Trains, Target Shooting, Metalworking, Woodworking, Guitar/Music, RC Helicopters/Airplanes, Hiking, Fishing, Camping and Geocaching.
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  1. Now I'm running into another problem that is preventing me from continuing with the process. My GFCI keeps tripping, causing the spa to cut off. I can't see to find a pattern. It happens at random. When this first happend, I figured it was a clogged filter, causing the pump to draw too much current and trip the GFCI. During the enzyme run, I actually took out the clogged filter and let the water run freely through the system, but it keeps cutting off. i'm going to contact the spa shop on Monday to see if they can provide me a different GFCI breaker to try out. I have a feeling this one could be the problem.
  2. OK, thanks! That was one of my concerns, but I guess I forgot to mention that in my last post. I have to make a trip up to the "big city" this weekend, so I'm going to drop by the shop that we bought the spa from and see if they carry the enzyme cleaner so I can get that now and get that part going. I can worry about ordering the rest this week.
  3. Again, thanks for all of the great information! I have yet to start on this, but when I do, should I fill up the spa to at least over the top jets to run the enzyme or can I get away with only coming up part way and allowing the upper jets to shoot the water out, without being submerged? I'm asking this because I foolishly drained the spa, not realizing that I would need to run the enzyme through with the old water, then drain and start with new, clean water. Here are the steps as I understand it, to get going again: 1. Fill to appropriate level. 2. Run enzyme cleaning solution. 3. Drain spa. 4. Fill again to appropriate level. 5. Balance water Ph. 6. Add sodium bromide to build up bromine bank. 7. Shock water 8. Put floater in with bromine tablets. 9. Test daily
  4. OK, thanks for that info! I figured that the OneShock was basically a name for something that was readily available for less money by it's chemical name. You bring up a good point, though. I was curious about the use of plain, unscented bleach as my method of keeping the water bacteria free. I understand that I still need to keep the water Ph balanced. Thanks!
  5. Can I at least preface this with "I had never owned a pool or spa prior to this."? I guess I foolishly believed the spa shop when they told me once I had the water balanced, we only needed to put shock in AFTER each use. He told us to test the water weekly and keep an eye on it. Also, I was made well aware that the Nature2 stick would only last 3-4 months and then I would have to replace it. As far as the sanitizer level, this was one of the constant battles. You say that you can't let it get low, but I would add more as instructed by the shop to keep the level up and then testing showed that it was through the roof. Also, there were times that the water became cloudy and they told me to put in about ten times the amount of shock as normal. I can't tell you how much money I have wasted on dumping piles and piles of chemicals into the water to balance it out, just to have it fail every time. As I stated above, I have read the stickies pointed out to me and I am in the process of ordering a new test kit, a new filter, enzyme cleaner, sodium bromide granules and more bromine tablets. I already have the floater. I have seen conflicting information on the floater. Some said bromine tablets only and at least a couple places said bromine AND chlorine tablets together. Which one is correct? When we noticed how bad the water had become, we decided to drain the tub of the old water. I feel like this was a mistake now, because I'll need to put water back in to run the enzyme through the system. Then drain it and start over with fresh water. I have even found one of these "spa stick" filters for about $30 to re-fill with and hopefully filter out some of the harsh metals in our well water.
  6. Thanks! I have started with reading the stickies you suggested. I'm not looking at what it will cost to purchase a new test kit, filter and the required chemicals to get this going again.
  7. We have had our DuraSport spa since last fall and we love it, but keeping the chemistry balanced has been a nightmare for us. We started off with Nature2, since that is what the spa shop suggested. They tested our water and had us dump a pile of chemicals into it, just to get the water neutral. We then started with the day to day chemical up keep, using the Nature2 sitting in the trap basket (they told us NOT to place it down in the filter). Anyways, after a while, no matter how much testing we did and putting more Ph up/down or shock in, we would get cloudy water and then we started to have bacteria problems. A friend suggested that bromine tablets in a floater worked well for him, so we decided to give that a shot. For a couple of months, the water would never clear up, but it never smelled and we didn't seem to have any problems. All of a sudden we started to have problems with the pump cutting off and tripping the GFCI. An inspection of the filter found that it was clogged up. My guess was the pump was overdrawing current and tripping the breaker. I soaked it in a filter cleaner, put it back in and things ran well for a couple more months. Just last week, we noticed that the pump had cut off again, tripping the GFCI. Same problem, only this time the filter was much worse than the first time, clogged with yellow slimey muck. Right now, I have the filter soaking to clean it again. Obviously the bromine is NOT working and I have gotten way off track. As a last resort, we pumped out the tub this weekend, put the filter in a clean soak and decided that we need to step back and punt to fix this problem. I'm trying to decide what is best. Should I go back to the Nature2? I know that out water is very poor do to it being simply treated well water. This is what prompted the blitzkrieg of chemicals when we first filled it up. I assume I will have to go through this again to get the Ph back in the right window, but we had such a horrible time keeping it balanced. That brings me to my final questions, EcoOne OneShock tablets. Do they really work or are they just a mythical solution? They say drop a few in and walk away. I just don't believe that it's THAT simple. They do mention having to shock every few weeks and also having to use Ph up/down to keep the water balanced. I half expected that. Should this whole thing be this difficult? Does everyone have this much trouble keeping their tubs balanced or am I just a dumbass that can't figure it out? Thanks!
  8. If you have a multi-meter or even better an oscilloscope, put it on pin 2 and see if you are getting either ~12VDC RMS with the meter or you can see ~24Vp-p with the scope. If you can, then there is a good chance the signals are RS232 serial. At that point, connect a computer running a terminal program like HyperTerminal (built into Windows XP) and see if you can see any data. You'll have to play with the baud rates to see what it's set at, but it's probably 4800 or 9600 baud. Of course, this is ALL pending on the chance that the controller is periodically spitting out serial data on this port. It might require seeing a command first, before talking. It's worth a shot though.
  9. Only having my spa a week, I am still trying to refine my setup. However, I am happy with it so far. I have a 12x12 concrete patio behind my garage and I placed the spa in the back right corner to allow for easy access coming through the back garage door: We bought the standard steps that our local spa/pool shop carried. I opted for one drawer unit that slides under the top step: Yesterday, I picked up some treated lumber and composite deck boards to build a little "walkway" from the back of the garage, right up to the spa: Last, until I decide how I want to enclose the patio, I put up a temp pop-up shelter with the bug mesh sides. I also have three windwalls that came with it, for extra privacy. I'll put these up once I am happy with the position. (The wind was playing hell with the mesh when I took the picture!)
  10. I just got off the phone with a Durasport tech and he was able to really set me straight: 1. The "cool" LED lighting up is ACTUALLY an indication that the heater is ON. This is a bit confusing, since the LED is right under the "cool" button. However, the heat button does not have an LED under it, so they use the LED under the "cool" button to indicate this. 2. The temp sensor is actually only good to about the 70F mark. When I put in the fresh, cold water, I was assuming the temp reading was accurate at about the 70F mark. In reality, it was just reading the bottom number until the water's actual temp rose to 70F and above. Once it reached this 70F threshold, it started to display the actual water temp. 3. At 110V, the heater is running at 1000 watts. He said the temp rise is roughly 1 degree per hour at that rate. Once I switch to 220V, I'll see a quadruple to 4000 watts of heating. Also, when the spa is in 110V mode, you cannot change the mode, you can't even get into the menu. Once I have 220V connected and the DIP switches are re-configured for this, I'll have access to these advanced menus. I hope this info will help any future G2 owners.
  11. OK, that makes sense. I understand that it was going to take much longer, I was just hoping that by the time I got up this morning it would be close to the 104F mark. I think the fact that "cool" turns on at some point automatically is contributing to why I'm not seeing it get up to temp. I left it running all day while I am here at work, so I'll check it when I get home. I am still very curious about the mode and how to get into that menu option in the controller. The panel is very simple with only four buttons and a small 4 -6 character LCD.... That brings up another question. Is there any way to upgrade the controller to some kind of aftermarket or do they tend to be so specific to the tub that it's hard to replace it?
  12. Hello All! My name is Jason and I am new to the forum. I live in Greenbackville, VA and I work with the NASA Wallops Flight Facility. I am also a first-time spa owner as of yesterday. I have a few questions about my spa and I am hoping that someone else on the forum already has a G2 and can point out that I am just blind and not seeing the obvious. 1. I am right now connected to 110V, but I plan to make the switch to 240V as soon as I can get the electrician over to run 240V to that side of the house. However, in the meantime I want to use the spa. I plugged it in last night around 6PM. The water temp was right at 70F. I set the temp to the max of 104F. By 10PM that night, it had only gone up to 74F. By this morning, around 7AM, it was at 95F. Is this typical of a 110V system? I knew it would be slow at 110V, but it seems to be really taking a long time. 2. I noticed that after a couple of hours last night, the "cool" button lit up and it didn't appear to be heating anywhere beyond the 74F mark. I ended up having to push the heat button a couple of times and turning the jets on and then off to get it out of the "cool" mode. At least I think it was in a cooling mode. When I checked it this morning, it was at the 95F mark, but the "cool" was lit up again. Has any other G2 owners seen this? Is this a sign of a problem? 3. This morning, I was reading about the modes that are offered and it dawned on me that it might be in economy mode. The manual states to press either the cool or heat button, followed by the light button to confirm the mode. Pressing the cool or heat button just results in changing the temp setting and pressing the light button either does nothing at all or turns on the light. I think I am missing something in the button sequence, but I am not sure what. I would assume they would make this so any idiot could operate/program it (so it should be right up my alley ), but I can't seem to get it going to at least check what mode it's in. Thanks for any help/advice in advance! Jason
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