Has anyone added a 30a breaker to the 50a GFI spa panel?

jeffmeh · Mar 16, 2013

AllanMar said:
If your going to drop the wire size from the GFCI panel (50A breaker) it needs to be UL489. As mentioned above UL489 is to meet NEC requirement. NEC requires a 30A overcurrent protector for your 10gauge wire from the modified GFCI, a UL1077 device does NOT satisfy this requirement.

As mentioned UL1077 is supplemental protection, meaning you already have some other protection. If you are dropping to 30A with the supplemental protection you have NO primary protection at 30A. This is like saying you can use UL1077 breakers off your bus bar's in your panel because you have the 100/200A main breaker....

This is a very common mistake and I see it done in industry alot as well (and fails panel certification)

If you want to do it cheap, what about a Fused disconnect they sell for Air conditioners/etc?

EDIT: Yes, NEC ends at outlet but then UL panel specifications are supposed to take over (in industry), but as most people don't usually have access or desire to follow they stick with the NEC. Certaintly you can do whatever you want we are not building industrial panels here. So if you don't follow it thats your choice, but that doesnt change the facts.

EDIT2: Why not something like this, with a small peice of 6AWG wire and a short conduit to connect the two panels. Physically bigger, but cheap. http://www.homedepot.com/p/t/202106...gId=-1&storeId=10051&N=5yc1vZbm0h&R=202106492 Modifying the GFCI panel is also likely a bit of an issue.... You can usually also get single breaker panels/disconnects cheaply as well (http://www.homedepot.com/p/t/100177...gId=-1&storeId=10051&N=5yc1vZbm2w&R=100177812), and you could throw a regular 30A breaker in it (still going to be a bit more money though)

Thanks Allan. I'm curious though, what is the point of a UL1077 breaker if you cannot depend upon it to trip when its rating is exceeded? Or to put it another way, if I already have, say, a 30a breaker providing branch circuit protection, why would I bother putting in an additional UL1077 30a breaker?

AllanMar · Mar 16, 2013

There are a few scenarios. Mainly when the feed does NOT leave the control panel they can/are used. Like to provide a 5a feed to a Plc inside a control panel. Anti-condensate heaters within panels, etc etc. I see them often used also primarily as a disconnect within the panel for maintenance.

Google UL489 vs ul1077 the manufacture usually put out decent explanations. The risk is pretty low, I just wanted anyone interested to know what the rules would be. It's up to you how far you want to take it. Once you modify the spa panel and add any breaker you've likely voided the rating anyway (ul489 or ul1077).

Edit: missed one of your questions. You can rely on it to trip under certain scenarios. Again it's another case of what a product is certified to do, not necessarily what it's likely to so.

alien · Apr 4, 2013

Sorry to rake over this... I am confused.

I have a 50A range cable supplying my control panel from a 50A spa panel. I want 30A breakers within the control panel itself to protect the heating elements as well as the plugs, sockets, and cables that supply the elements. Is it OK if the breakers inside the control panel are ul1077?

P-J · Apr 4, 2013

alien said:
Sorry to rake over this... I am confused.

I have a 50A range cable supplying my control panel from a 50A spa panel. I want 30A breakers within the control panel itself to protect the heating elements as well as the plugs, sockets, and cables that supply the elements. Is it OK if the breakers inside the control panel are ul1077?

Absolutely. No problem at all.

runningweird · Apr 29, 2013

hope someone is still watching this one.

I have a 50 amp spa panel feeding off a 60 amp breaker from my homes main panel. the spa panel works fine and is all wired up to brew on. I wanted to add some regular 110 outlets just below the spa panel in the garage, is it possible to wire a single pole breaker into the spa panel?

my panel is nearly identical to the one in post # 5

jeffmeh · Apr 29, 2013

runningweird said:
hope someone is still watching this one.

I have a 50 amp spa panel feeding off a 60 amp breaker from my homes main panel. the spa panel works fine and is all wired up to brew on. I wanted to add some regular 110 outlets just below the spa panel in the garage, is it possible to wire a single pole breaker into the spa panel?

my panel is nearly identical to the one in post # 5

I don't see why not. If you want it to be protected by the GFCI in the spa panel, you would split the output (one H and N), run it to a 15a or 20a breaker, then out of the panel with a ground wire off the ground bus, to your outlet box. As we discussed earlier in the thread, you should be able to fit a DIN breaker in the upper right of the spa panel.

If you want to bypass the spa panel GFCI, you would have to split one hot before the GFCI breaker, and run that and a neutral from the neutral bus through the breaker, and run the output and a ground from the ground bus, to your outlet box. You could use GFCI outlets in that case, if you wanted.

I think I have this right, but as always, IANAE.

runningweird · Apr 29, 2013

So I would just cut and pigtail another line into a hot and the neutral wires leading to my dryer outlet and wire those to the new outlets, sounds like it might work. I will give it a try tomorrow.

thanks

runningweird · Apr 30, 2013

well, that didn't work. I used a 30 amp dual pole din breaker( an eaton wmzs2c30), ran a line from neutral line out of the gfci breaker, and one hot from the gfci to the new breaker, then out to the outlets. POP go the breakers.

jeffmeh · Apr 30, 2013

runningweird said:
well, that didn't work. I used a 30 amp dual pole din breaker( an eaton wmzs2c30), ran a line from neutral line out of the gfci breaker, and one hot from the gfci to the new breaker, then out to the outlets. POP go the breakers.

Check all the wiring. This should really be no different than splitting off 120v from a hot and a neutral inside the control panel, yes?

Was there any load on the outlet, or did the breakers flip with no load? Both breakers flipped?

Incidentally, what type of receptacles are you using for the 120v outlet? Using a 30a breaker, you should be using 30a rated receptacles.

runningweird · Apr 30, 2013

I have 30 amp plugs, i got it all worked out. the single pole breaker does wire just like it would in any other panel, I had a wiring issue at the outlets.

jeffmeh · Apr 30, 2013

Happy to hear it.

BadWolfBrewing · Jul 28, 2013

This is an old thread, but hopefully an expert will see and answer...

I am looking to do something similar. I have a 50a breaker in the main panel that I can't change. I have a 50a spa panel, and I'm building a 30a control panel.

I plan on adding a din rail to the spa panel, with a 30a double pole breaker for the 2 hot lines. Should I also add a 15 or 20a for the neutral? The neutral will only be carrying current from pumps and housekeeping power.

Or, do I need to add the 15a breaker in the control panel to one of the hot wires after the power to the heating elements splits off?

The second option seems more standard, but the control panel is going to be crowded and I'd like to move as much as possible to the spa panel.

Many thanks

neild5 · Jul 28, 2013

BadWolfBrewing said:
This is an old thread, but hopefully an expert will see and answer...

I am looking to do something similar. I have a 50a breaker in the main panel that I can't change. I have a 50a spa panel, and I'm building a 30a control panel.

I plan on adding a din rail to the spa panel, with a 30a double pole breaker for the 2 hot lines. Should I also add a 15 or 20a for the neutral? The neutral will only be carrying current from pumps and housekeeping power.

Or, do I need to add the 15a breaker in the control panel to one of the hot wires after the power to the heating elements splits off?

The second option seems more standard, but the control panel is going to be crowded and I'd like to move as much as possible to the spa panel.

Many thanks

You do not want a breaker on the neutral, a 15 amp single pole breaker in the spa panel is the way to go, a lot of spa panels have room for 1.

BadWolfBrewing · Jul 29, 2013

Must have been suffering from a beer or two, a breaker on the neutral is not a good idea.

I found some reasonably priced DIN rail 2 pole breakers, and there is plenty of room in the spa panel. So, power-in from 50A wall circuit goes into 50A gfci breaker, output of that goes to input of 30A DIN mount breaker. This goes to a receptacle for the control panel power cord.

I'll use a small breaker in the control panel to locally step down to a 15A (or even 6A is enough) circuit I guess. If I put the 15A breaker in the spa panel, I'll have to carry 5 wires from the spa panel to the control panel (2 30A rated hots, 1 15A rated hot, common, ground), which is weird...

This all seem alright?

Bobby_M · Oct 18, 2013

I'm bumping this only because I made the incorrect assumption (while standing in Home Depot) that the extra breaker position in the Midwest 50a spa box was a post GFCI. Duh, I should have looked it up ahead of time or took the time to grab a screwdriver in the store to have a look.

There were a lot of questions regarding why you'd want to do this and I'm sure everyone has their own reason. Here's mine. I installed a 50a breaker in the main panel and ran 6/4 romex over to the spa panel. From there it goes to a separate 50a outlet. The plan is to construct a brewing panel that will use every bit of the 50a, but I want to do some testing on simple 30a control boxes without having to run 6/4 SOOW cable at a whopping $4 a foot.

Now I'm just considering making a modular 240v subpanel on the end of a 6/4 cable with a 30a and 20a breaker in there along with a 50a, 30a, and 20a (all 240v) outlets in the cover. This contraption would give me access to all load requirements for testing and general use and they'd all be GFCI protected.

The [D] homeline 100a lug box is only $20 and another $25 or so for all the breakers. The bonus is that although I permanently installed my spa panel, this breakout box would be fully portable and come with me when I move. Any problems with that?

BadWolfBrewing · Oct 31, 2013

I ended up putting a 30a din rail breaker in the spa panel. It is tight, but works.

You can take the little breaker guts out of the spa panel and put it into something bigger, I thought about doing that. That will give you more room to add some din rail breakers, which are really easy to use and look snappy

Lumpyyyyy · Apr 20, 2015

Reviving this thread in the hope that someone will see and point me in the right direction. I'm looking for a 240V, 30A din rail break and had two questions.

1) Can something like this work for what is being discussed here?

2) For wiring, is this connected inline, between the 50amp GFCI breaker on the spa panel and the outlet to go to the control panel? I imagine it will only be for the two hot lines and not the ground/neutral, is this correct?

Again, yes I know this is an old thread, but find it applicable for my question.

neild5 · Apr 20, 2015

Yes it will work, the spa panel is going provide the GFCI protection. The 30 amp breaker will protect the control panel. This what I have, just a different mount

Has anyone added a 30a breaker to the 50a GFI spa panel?

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