Spa panel wiring question

HumulusHead said:

Hey all. Quick question for anybody with spa panel wiring experience. I've searched the forums but I can't find a solution for my problem.

My problem is that I got my spa panel wired up but when I plug it in, it trips instantly.

Here's some background.

I ran 10/3 wire from my main panel to garage. In my main panel I installed a 30A non gfci breaker. 2 hot legs to the breaker. Neutral and ground attached to the grounding bus.

Wired up to a 14-30 Nema receptacle.

Tested outlet with multi meter. Each hot to ground gives me 120v. Each hot to neutral gives me 120. Hot to hot gives me 240. Neutral to ground gives me 0. I believe that Is what I should be getting.

I wired up the spa panel according to the PJ diagram for 4 wire.

When I plug in the spa panel the breaker trips instantly.

I unplugged all of the load wires from the gfci and plugged in again. Still trips. So this leads me to believe that the problem is on the line side of the spa panel. I feel like I have the line side wired correctly though.

Any suggestions?

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trimixdiver1 said:

You may have an issue with your neutral/ground buss, I've seen issues with sharing the buss and not having separate but that's not that common, might be a bad breaker, can you install the gfci in your main panel? If so see if it still trips.

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HumulusHead said:

Well I'm kinda assuming here, but I think my panel is ok to share the neutral and ground bus. My house was built 2 years ago and the bus is full of ground and neutral.

I'm kinda leaning towards a bad breaker, but I've heard that's uncommon. And I'm hoping that's not the problem since I spent all this money on the spa panel. Which I got off eBay. So I don't think I can return it...

My main panel is a homeline and the gfci is a GE. It looks like it would fit, but I've heard that's not a good idea to put a diff breaker in there?

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jeffmeh said:

Do you have a picture of how you wired the spa panel? Mistakes are fairly common here. If so, it is a pretty easy fix. Make sure the neutral is connected to the breaker pigtail, and the only thing connected to the breaker pigtail.

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trimixdiver1 said:

Just to see if it works, try it. It's not rated for permanent use.

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Lennie said:

While we are waiting on Humulus' pics, a related question. I wired my system exactly as he did, 30amp breaker in main panel to spa panel in the garage. I purchased a spa panel that has a 60amp gfci breaker. I want it just for an on/off switch as well as for the GFCI, so I didn't think it mattered that the breaker was 60amp. My question is, because the breaker is 60amp will the GFCI still work the same?

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Bobby_M said:

I would bet that you have your load side neutral wire attached to the bussbar when it's supposed to be wired to the correct terminal on the breaker. I made this mistake TWICE on the same panel 2 years apart.

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HumulusHead said:

I actually do have the load neutral attached to the breaker terminal. Even if I unplug all of the load side wires from the gfci breaker it still trips

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