2006 Hot Spring Sovereign II - NO HEAT

[Slugger]

Sorry if this is redundant but I’ve read a few posts on here with similar issues and after following the advice and troubleshooting I still haven’t identified the problem.

We recently bought this 2006 Hot Spring Sovereign II hot tub used from a US army service member.  It was dry and in storage so we had no way to check it but he swore that it all worked.  It looked good and was a very fair price so we trusted him and bought it.  Then it sat outside empty and unused for a month while our deck was being repaired in the Atlanta, GA cold and I’m sure wasn’t properly winterized (temps dipped below freezing a couple times).  It ended up with a bit of rainwater in it too from having a leaky cover.  But we finally got our deck finished and cleaned it up well and can’t wait to use it!  Only problem is the heater isn’t working.  Very frustrating...  Please help.  I’m an engineer and have done and observed the following in this order.  If you are good at this and know this brand please provide input:

- After cleaning and sanitizing we filled the tub with garden hose stuck down in the main gray standpipe (at this point all filters were removed and trashed while we waited on new ones)

- Adjusted water and chemicals per instructions.  Tested all pumps and jets.  All seemed to be working fine.  Red Power light solid.  Green light off.  Let it run to keep circulating water.  Used clean microfiber clothes as filters while we waited on our filters to arrive.

- New filters arrived and installed next day.  Power cycled spa.  Waited 24 hours

- Water still very cold at 60 deg F   Red Power light solid.  Green light off.

- Circulation pump seems to be functioning fine because the “soothing stream water feature” is flowing well and ozone bubbles are steadily rising from drain in the bottom of tub

- Read manual downloaded from internet several times (could be different year model manual).  

- Checked electrical panel wiring and breakers.  All are working fine

- Checked power entering spa circuit board with voltmeter and I get ~230V on both circuits coming to spa board.  

- Reset power to spa for 1 minute several times in case of high limit thermostat tripping.  Don’t know how to reset Integrated pressure switch (manual says correcting water flow issues will reset it)

- Waited another 24 hours and still 60 deg F 

- checked spa main board lights.  Lim OK is GREEN.  Htr ON is RED.  see image attached below

- checked heater relay board power terminals to heater wire.  Got 113V on each leg to ground (checked both legs).  I checked this with spa running and heater terminals connected

- Shut off spa at panel.  Removed heater wires from heater relay board terminals.  Put voltmeter in Ohm mode.  Checked resistance accross Red and Black wire going to heater and got 11 Ohms.

- Felt around for a high limit thermostat reset button on heater but did not find one (my heater has blue sticker shown below)

 

ANY IDEAS FROM HERE?  

Could my heater be bad and still read 11 ohms across?

Could I have a water flow/blockage issue even though main board shows Htr ON RED?

Not sure what to do next.  Please help.  See images attached.

THANKS GUYS!!!

 

[RDspaguy]

1 hour ago, Slugger said:

Got 113V on each leg to ground (checked both legs).

As you will with a bad relay. Test from terminal to terminal for 240v. I suspect you will find 0 volts, and a burned out solder point on the back of the relay board. An electronics repair guy can fix it easily. The new boards are sometimes problematic, so it's worth rebuilding the old one.

Your heater is fine.

[Slugger]

Wow OK.  I hope this is true and I’ll test tomorrow.  If I have regular solder and an iron can I just clean up the burned part and put some solder on the joint myself?  Is that safe and effective?

[RDspaguy]

No, the relay is the cause, the burned solder is the result. You need a relay. If your soldering skills are good, you can do it yourself. But you only get one chance to screw it up.

[Slugger]

7 hours ago, RDspaguy said:

No, the relay is the cause, the burned solder is the result. You need a relay. If your soldering skills are good, you can do it yourself. But you only get one chance to screw it up.

RDspaguy - you are the man!   I am pretty damn good at troubleshooting and using a voltmeter and would not have found this.  You taught me something about relays. And you saved us lots of cash.  Thank you for being willing to help and having the knowledge and saving our day  🙏 🙏 🙏.  I will try to pay it forward on here if I can.  
 

here is the backside of our heater relay board:

[Slugger]

For others going through this:

I didn’t realize I needed to check voltage across terminal to terminal on the heater relay board due to it being a relay.  But it totally makes sense.  When I did that I got 0V just as RDspaguy predicted.   I live near GA Tech University so I have many skilled electronics techs around.  I will leave the board repair job to them...

So for reference to others:  to check for this problem you find the thick black power wire coming from the heater and at the end of it where it connects to the heater relay board (which is the smaller board on the left where the main power also connects).  It connects with a black, white and green wire.  Each one has spade terminals on the end that slip onto the terminals on the board.  Put your voltmeter in AC Voltage mode and with all the power on to your spa, stick one voltmeter probe on the black wire terminal and the other probe on the white wire terminal. Make sure both probes are contacting metal.  The meter should read 220-240V if the relay board is functioning properly AND everything else is working and the spa is calling for heat.  To check that the board is sending out power to the heater at all, you can leave one probe on the black or white terminal and move the other probe to the ground terminal (green wire) and the meter will read 110-130V.  This is called checking “each leg”.  If each leg has ~120V power but you get ZERO across the two black and white terminals your relay board probably looks like mine in the back!

To remove the board you will, turn off both panel breakers (all power to spa), take a good photo of all electrical connections so you can reconnect properly, then remove all wires connected to heater relay board only, then remove four screws from that board (2 are part of grounding terminals) then carefully wiggle the board off of the main board where it is connected.  There are videos on youtube about “replace heater relay board Hot Spring spa”

Good luck out there guys and be safe. When in doubt call a professional 

[RDspaguy]

45 minutes ago, Slugger said:

RDspaguy - you are the man!   I am pretty damn good at troubleshooting and using a voltmeter and would not have found this.  You taught me something about relays. And you saved us lots of cash.  Thank you for being willing to help and having the knowledge and saving our day  🙏 🙏 🙏.  I will try to pay it forward on here if I can.  
 

here is the backside of our heater relay board:

If you can't pay it forward here, do so somewhere else. I am only on this forum in response to some great help I got on a diesel truck forum. I know **** about diesels so am no help there, so I came here instead.

[Slugger]

So I took the board to a mobile phone and TV repair shop. They are checking the board and relay, then re-soldering it back together for $60.  Is this correct @RDspaguy?   No replacement of the relay necessary?   The tech was concerned that it might happen again if he simply solders it back together...  He thought the underlying problem could even be in the main control board but he said he can’t really know the cause unless the relay or board tests bad...  Thoughts on root cause?

[cranbiz]

Re-soldering isn't the answer. You need to replace the relay and repair the board.

The relay stuck closed. The contacts fused together. It's common in high current uses for that to eventually happen.

[RDspaguy]

The relay contacts are the problem. They are worn and not making a good contact, which produces heat. This heat can cause it to weld closed, as @cranbizsaid, but it doesn't have to for it to burn out the solder point. Testing with a tester will not reveal this, as the heat only occurs under full amp load. Tell them to replace the relay. They are readily available if he doesn't have them in stock.

[Slugger]

OK.  So I’ll just tell the guy to skip the diagnostic and replace the relay.  Maybe I’ll have him replace all of them?  Anybody have an idea where I can get these relays???

[RDspaguy]

Wouldn't hurt, but there is one relay that actually switches on the heater, and that's the one that goes. The others are already on when that one switches, so they don't arc, and it is arcing that wears the contacts.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08H4QXYGG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_imm_NDR7JKEW2Q69813Y6SGS?psc=1

[Slugger]

Ok. So I ordered the relay below which is almost an exact match.    It will arrive Monday.  

Any harm in leaving the hot tub full of water sitting idle while we wait?   The water is balanced and chlorinated but the circulation pump won’t be running...

 

relay:

G8P-1A4P-12VDC Fully-Sealed PCB Relay 30A 250VAC for PC Board or Panel-Mounted https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Z8LQHKB/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_N4RXGABK2RKBAM2XP0MH

[RDspaguy]

It will be fine. Just chlorinated heavily once it's running again.

[Spa Board Doctor]

Just FYI for future spa owners with this same problem, we do these relay replacements all the time.

spokanespas.com

[CanadianSpaTech]

Relays are cheap. If the spa is more than 5 years old replace them all...JMO

[Slugger]

Relay replaced. And now I get 240V across the black and white terminals where the heater connects to the heater relay board.  I am hoping we’re all good now.  But: 
 

Is the heater supposed to feel warm to the touch?  The long metal tubes?  After 10 minutes of runtime mine does not....

[Slugger]

OK.  So the good news is MY HEATER IS WORKING NOW and we used the hot tub for the first time last night!  It felt great after a lot of work to find, buy, move, clean and fix our first spa.

But now for some frustrating news.  I had the temp set at 100 yesterday.  Once the relay board was installed it reached that temp in about 7 hours and both the power light and ready light were solid for the first time :)  Once we got in it I decided 100 wasn't quite warm enough so I bumped up the set temp to 102.  We enjoyed our soak and everything seemed to be working fine.  I could feel warmer water flowing from the drain.  But when we got out I happened to notice that the red Power light was blinking at that point.  And the ready light was out.  I went to bed a bit frustrated.

Woke up this morning and the power light was still blinking.  But I checked the water temp with a handheld thermometer and it was right at 101.8.  So it seems the heater kept working overnight even with the red power light blinking...  I thought the blinking power light meant the high limit breaker had tripped so I expected to wake to a cooler tub...  At any rate, I reset both main electrical panel breakers for 30 seconds (they were both still on and no problems there). The tub restarted.  Power light went solid and five minutes later both power light and ready light are now solid.

What gives?  Do I have a water flow problem?  High limit thermostat problem?  What should I check?

The water feature is flowing fairly well...  All brand new filters.  Heater is heating...

[RDspaguy]

Could be a flow restriction. Could be a fluke. See if it keeps acting up. 

[Slugger]

4 minutes ago, RDspaguy said:

Could be a flow restriction. Could be a fluke. See if it keeps acting up. 

OK thanks.  I'lll try to make sure to report back here either way...

[GoatGal]

After months of research, we too were in the same situation as you with your hot tub. My husband replaced practically every component to troubleshoot, each time finding the same result of the breakers flipping each time we tried to turn up the heat. Today he took apart the heater and we found the water blockage that everyone talks about but never really discusses, a bunch of scale build up! He is in the process of cleaning it and will be reinstalling!!… YES IT WORKS!!! Heat is working, breakers are not tripping!!! Everything is working perfectly!!! Wish we would have tried this first!!! Even the previous owner had a hot tub repair guy come out and charge $375 to replace the small circuit board…. For nothing.  All it was was a flow blockage in the heater.