Oldest Working Hot Tub?

[KKay9]

And, maybe, oddest setup?

I've been lurking here for some time and have learned a lot, which has really helped with getting things running and under control.

I'm curious, what is the oldest hot tub going?

We bought a house two years ago that came with a 1985 Seven Seas, 250 gallon, hot tub...in the master bathroom, on the SECOND FLOOR! Eek!

My initial reaction was to rip it out and do something else with that space. My husband, however, decided, WTH, lets see what happens if we fill it. Now, I did drill a couple of discrete holes in the floor to see what kind of beams were under it first . It ran, it didn't fall through the floor. It did not heat over 80 degrees, though.

I had a purported spa tech out and he threw up his hands, saying it was older than he was and he had no idea. So, we went at it ourselves. Replaced the pressure switch, took the old Morgan heater out and cleaned iron deposits out of it (we're on well water, heavy with iron, we've since put a treatment system on it). Degunked the thermostat bulb thing...attempted to calibrate it to the dial(!) control up top.

The darned thing works GREAT! It's so simple, mostly mechanical....very straightforward and easy to repair because of it. Since it's inside, things are in very good shape, at 30 years old. I had some stumbles trying to figure out how to manage the water, but it's been consistently good for a year and a half now...thanks to a lot of reading here. Since it's inside, it stays pretty clean. We're using Nature 2/MPS and some chlorine. Swap the water out about every 3 months or when it doesn't balance easily or doesn't maintain sanitizer well. Because we are on septic, I won't put all that water down the drain and, instead, pump it out the window and off into the woods (also our property and I wait until chlorine is 0 before sending it out the window) with a long hose.

Very strange tub (a bit of a Frankentub, as the previous owners and us have used what parts we can get) and a very odd physical setup. But, we love it! I worry some about a leak, since it's upstairs, but, so far, so good. Humidity has not been a problem, there is an operable skylight directly over it and we put in a big, honking, active vent fan too. Best of all, it heats to well over 104. I prefer hotter and shorter time in the tub.

Anyone have anything older than this? I'll be back for advice if we run into trouble.

**BTW, I DID put paragraphs in, to make this easy to read, but the board doesn't seem to support them, at least on my browser **

[Roger]

I disposed of a almost working 26 YO tub a couple years back. but wow 30....and still working. It's a classic. Keep it going. A leak would scare me also. I'd move it out under the stars for it to retire.

[ZaC851]

You've got me beat. I've got a 1997 Morgan Spa. I had planned on buying a new one but when I went to a local spa place here and saw prices ranging from $8,000-12,000 dollars I quickly canceled that plan and started looking to buy used searching craigslist. I ended up buying 2 of them. I've got a 1997 model 5 person spa (110v) and the other spa (don't remember the model) is a 2005 8 person spa (220v). I got both believe it or not for $300 dollars almost 2 years ago. They were both a little rough on the outside and the guy couldn't figure out why it wouldn't heat up, and why the bigger one wouldn't turn on. Both problems were electrical that my Dad and I fixed in less than a hour. Due to the little spot where I planned on putting mine at which can be seen in the pics which is in a little hole surrounded by my wooden fence, I only had 80" of width and the 5 person spa ended up being 76" wide not to mention that I had no 220v hook up so I gave the much large 8 person spa to my Mom and Dad. it was much nicer than mine with digital controls and more jets etc but just to big for me. Besides the electrical, they only had to replace some exterior wood and buy a big cover, and replace two $20 dollar plastic jets which were cracked to get his running but they love it and has been going strong..

As for my 5 person spa, I replaced a few broken wooden panels on its outside enclosure and then stained the wood a darker color and bought a nice cover for it and some stairs (not pictured) but it had all it's original parts and worked great.. I installed 1 light in it because it had no lights. Everything else worked great with mine with only a couple downsides. One is that because its a 110 volt spa, it takes a LONG time to heat up when you fill it and I dump and fill mine every 3-4 months in the winter. It took over 30 hours to heat up the first time but it was mid 20s at the time as well. Still, thats MUCH slower than my parents 220v spa that only took a few hours in 20º temps to heat up to 102º Every 110v spa automatically shuts the heater off when the jets kick on so during the winter, you can't run the jets more than 30 minutes at a time other wise the water starts cooling off until I turn the jets off so that the heater kicks on which isn't a big deal since I never stay in it over 30 minutes. The first year I used it, it worked great, We used it 2-3 times a week mainly in the winter but it was awesome.

Not long ago, the original pump started making a loud whining noise which ended up being the spindle shaft that goes inside the motor and the pumps "wet end" also started leaking slowly. It continued to work just fine and both of those problems are fixable fixable but I just decided to do a big upgrade now that summer is here. Mainly because This spa had no digital control panel. Everything was operated by something called Air switches and I had to use a pool thermometer because the spa had no digital temp gauge or auto setting that would regulate the temperature by turning the heater on and off to keep the water at a steady temp so on really cold days when it was 30º F outside, Id set the heater so that the spa temp would be how I like it (99º-100º) but here in AL we tend to have crazy weather fluctuations so when the weather would rise up to 50º F days later the spa water would end up being too hot and going to 110º + and then of course the day after that the temps would go into single digits making the water too cold. LOL. The heater control knob had no numbers when setting the temperature so you had no idea how much you were lowering or increasing the temp each time. It was just a guessing game and a pain having to do it every other use..

Now that winters over and we'll start using the pool instead of the hot tube, I decided to do the upgrades and break down and buy a new pump, new heater and spa pack with a topside digital control panel along with some more lights. I think I am also going to get a spa stereo and 2 pop up speakers while I'm upgrading since they can be had for relatively cheap.. Ended up spending more on those parts than I have on both hot tubs but I think it'll be worth it. Few pics below. Also, anyone have any thoughts on a ozonator? I'm not even sure what it does but my spa control pack as the ability to add one and control so was just wondering. I test my pool and spa water atleast 1-2 a week and I have no issues keeping my spa's water numbers in check with very little effort so if a ozonator is suppose to help with that type of stuff I won't even bother. It's easy enough as it is.

Day I brought it home. The actual fiberglass shell is in great shape.

After fixing a few of the missing panels, staining the wood, and buying a cover heres what it looked like

New parts. Cant wait to be able to adjust the temperature and have the heater regulate the temp rather than having to take the side panels off and adjust the heater knob by guessing everytime the weather gets warmer or colder.