Qhantity Of Chemicals In An Arctic Spa Vs Caldera

[1st Time Buyer]

Hi All,

I am about to buy a spa and I am split between an Arctic Spa and a Caldera. My Arctic Spa dealer tells me that he treats his spa with one cartridge of Shock Treatment a week and that is all he has to do with chlorine. If I understood him correctly, I do not have to add anything else thanks to Arctic Spa filtration system and in teh end this will be cheaper than the solutions offered by Caldera.

Can anyone here with experience with Spas comment? Is is really cheaper to run one vs. the other?

[Boetta]

Hi All,

I am about to buy a spa and I am split between an Arctic Spa and a Caldera. My Arctic Spa dealer tells me that he treats his spa with one cartridge of Shock Treatment a week and that is all he has to do with chlorine. If I understood him correctly, I do not have to add anything else thanks to Arctic Spa filtration system and in teh end this will be cheaper than the solutions offered by Caldera.

Can anyone here with experience with Spas comment? Is is really cheaper to run one vs. the other?

The chemical use is the same in any spa you buy, except if you have a saltsystem in the spa. You will need Chlorine or Bromine as a sanitizer and PH up/down to adjust your PH.

Arctic also offers saltsystems in their spas, then you only need to adjust the PH down if the spa has not been used for a long time, and no additional chemical use.

The filters will not sanitize the spas, they are there to pick up "big" particles.

any dealers will try to sell you a bunch of different chemicals, but you really only need a sanitizer and ph adjust.

[Tom]

I do not have to add anything else thanks to Arctic Spa filtration system and in teh end this will be cheaper than the solutions offered by Caldera.

Thanks, Boetta, for a good answer. I wonder if that was the Onzen system, rather than the filtration system, the salesman was discussing. Onzen is a combination salt and ozone stystem.

[spatech (the unreal one)]

Hi All,

I am about to buy a spa and I am split between an Arctic Spa and a Caldera. My Arctic Spa dealer tells me that he treats his spa with one cartridge of Shock Treatment a week and that is all he has to do with chlorine. If I understood him correctly, I do not have to add anything else thanks to Arctic Spa filtration system and in teh end this will be cheaper than the solutions offered by Caldera.

Can anyone here with experience with Spas comment? Is is really cheaper to run one vs. the other?

The filtration between the two will be very similar so that isn't the issue. What you're seeing is the difference between what two dealers recommend. Personally I'm not a believer in the "you only have to add this once a week" method that sounds great to a new spa person but doesn’t perform well and I hope that wasn't said to sway you. Unless you’re talking about a floating sanitizer or a salt system you really should be adding a little sanitizer AFTER each use. In the end you will be able to work with either dealer to find what works for you so go ahead and just get whichever of the two spas you truly prefer.

[1st Time Buyer]

Gents,

Thank you very much for the very informative replies. Here is part of an email my dealer sent to explain to me what kind of maintenance I should expect to do on an Arctic spa and of course he used the opportunity to compare it with the Caldera I am also considering.

But, I am just interested in your opinion if this is a realistic maintenance schedule for an Arctic Spa...

Arctic Spas: Shock- $52.47 a year, Frog silver cartridge-$95.85 a year, Filter- $75.00 a year (disposable 3x$25)

The Frontier Hot tub I am looking at does not come with ONZEN but I seem to remember that it comes with some form of OZONE system as a standard piece of equipment.

I also noted that the dealer infromed me to change the filter 3 times a year, thus every four months but the user manual I downloaded from the Arctic web site indicates that if ought to be changed every 3 months. Is this a big deal if I change it less often, won't it damage my pump?

Any advice that would help me better plan and budget maintenance would be greatly appreciated in order for me to be better able to understand the long term care cost of the Arctic Spa...

[spatech (the unreal one)]

1) The shock amount sounds about right but I am a firm believer that this non-chlorine method of just shock and the silver cartridge (and ozone hopefully) is short sighted. We've had numerous discussions of this on this website about it and I know that is what the silver cartridge supplier says you can do but that is to sell people on its effectively and make people feel good that they don't need chlorine. From my experience, after people try this they eventually see it is a limited approach and that chlorine is needed (and works great). Again, this has NOTHING to do with which spa you buy. There are dealers of all brands who sell people on this approach and you can use the silver cartridge and shock alone method on ANY spa if you so choose. So, IMO I think you should expect to add about maybe $35/year in expected chlorine use to that and you’re fine.

2) Water maintenance on both spas will be the same and pretty easy once you get the hang of it. I know new owners are apprehensive about this but in a short amount of time you'll be to the point where you'll misplace the written instructions and not even care. As far as the filters go, I'm not a fan of the disposable type for any spa brand. IMO it adds nothing and is costly. I'd ask if there is an alternative so you can save $$ and use a standard filter which will last a couple years. Either way, this is yet another thing that I would not worry about when choosing which spa to get.

Gents,

Thank you very much for the very informative replies. Here is part of an email my dealer sent to explain to me what kind of maintenance I should expect to do on an Arctic spa and of course he used the opportunity to compare it with the Caldera I am also considering.

But, I am just interested in your opinion if this is a realistic maintenance schedule for an Arctic Spa...

Arctic Spas: Shock- $52.47 a year, Frog silver cartridge-$95.85 a year, Filter- $75.00 a year (disposable 3x$25)

The Frontier Hot tub I am looking at does not come with ONZEN but I seem to remember that it comes with some form of OZONE system as a standard piece of equipment.

I also noted that the dealer infromed me to change the filter 3 times a year, thus every four months but the user manual I downloaded from the Arctic web site indicates that if ought to be changed every 3 months. Is this a big deal if I change it less often, won't it damage my pump?

Any advice that would help me better plan and budget maintenance would be greatly appreciated in order for me to be better able to understand the long term care cost of the Arctic Spa...

[Urbane Lion]

1) The shock amount sounds about right but I am a firm believer that this non-chlorine method of just shock and the silver cartridge (and ozone hopefully) is short sighted. We've had numerous discussions of this on this website about it and I know that is what the silver cartridge supplier says you can do but that is to sell people on its effectively and make people feel good that they don't need chlorine. From my experience, after people try this they eventually see it is a limited approach and that chlorine is needed (and works great). Again, this has NOTHING to do with which spa you buy. There are dealers of all brands who sell people on this approach and you can use the silver cartridge and shock alone method on ANY spa if you so choose. So, IMO I think you should expect to add about maybe $35/year in expected chlorine use to that and you’re fine.

2) Water maintenance on both spas will be the same and pretty easy once you get the hang of it. I know new owners are apprehensive about this but in a short amount of time you'll be to the point where you'll misplace the written instructions and not even care. As far as the filters go, I'm not a fan of the disposable type for any spa brand. IMO it adds nothing and is costly. I'd ask if there is an alternative so you can save $$ and use a standard filter which will last a couple years. Either way, this is yet another thing that I would not worry about when choosing which spa to get.

Gents,

Thank you very much for the very informative replies. Here is part of an email my dealer sent to explain to me what kind of maintenance I should expect to do on an Arctic spa and of course he used the opportunity to compare it with the Caldera I am also considering.

But, I am just interested in your opinion if this is a realistic maintenance schedule for an Arctic Spa...

Arctic Spas: Shock- $52.47 a year, Frog silver cartridge-$95.85 a year, Filter- $75.00 a year (disposable 3x$25)

The Frontier Hot tub I am looking at does not come with ONZEN but I seem to remember that it comes with some form of OZONE system as a standard piece of equipment.

I also noted that the dealer infromed me to change the filter 3 times a year, thus every four months but the user manual I downloaded from the Arctic web site indicates that if ought to be changed every 3 months. Is this a big deal if I change it less often, won't it damage my pump?

Any advice that would help me better plan and budget maintenance would be greatly appreciated in order for me to be better able to understand the long term care cost of the Arctic Spa...

I'm using a salt water system combined with a disposable filter in my Arctic Spa and apart from from a little instant shock after a couple of heavy uses, I have yet to add any other chemicals to the water. Again, I really don't think the make of spa is of any importance. My dealer recommends changing the disposable filters every 3 months. At this rate, I estimate maintenance costs at less than $150/year including filters