Question about main panel/spa panel setup

[gregkeller]

So I'm slowly working on the conversion to electric. I am going to build my full eherms panel here in the next few weeks after I get the last few odds and ends, then electrify my HLT, put a herms coil in it, and finally electrify the boil kettle. My goal is to build it up one piece at a time so it is useful, but not have to do any work twice, like rebuild a panel. I am ultimately wanting to move this indoors to my basement, but that is probably a full year-18 months away. Here is my question. My house had a hot tub outside that we got rid of after we moved in. The electrical is still in place, 50 amp spa panel and all, so all I've got to do it wire in an outlet from the spa panel. I'm assuming they make outdoor (weatherproof) outlets for this kind of power? My issue is that in my electrical box in the basement is a 60 amp breaker. I will plan this out as a 30 amp panel, is that a problem? It doesn't seem like it should be, but just wanted to make sure before I do something stupid. It would be easy enough to swap out the breaker for a 30 amp breaker in the box if I needed to, but less work is always better.

 

[doug293cz]

You can use your existing breakers (50A & 60A) to feed a 30A panel, but for the 50A feed the wire to the control panel needs to be 6AWG. You can hook the 6AWG wire to 30A breakers in the control panel, and then run 10AWG from there. From the 60A breaker the feed wire needs to be 4AWG until you get to 30A breakers.

Brew on

 

[gregkeller]

The line from the breaker to the spa panel is already in place. I’ll just be installing a line from the spa panel to a plug that my panel will attach to. I’ll use the wire that I kept after I removed the hot tub for that.

 

[itsnotrequired]

replacing the existing 60 amp breaker with a 30 amp would be the easiest route, no need to replace any conductors. the 30 amp breaker in the panel provides overcurrent and short circuit protection while the 50 amp breaker in the spa panel will provide gfci protection. and a 'regular' breaker is cheap, probably less than $10. if going this route, be sure to check the terminal rating on the 30 amp breaker, to confirm it can accept the existing conductors. it varies by manufacturer but i believe the biggest conductor a 30 amp can take is a #6. some manufacturer's only allow a #8 as the largest. this is a relatively simple fix though as you can splice a #10 conductor onto the existing inside the panel and then terminate that on the 30 amp breaker.

another option is to leave existing as-is and put a 30 amp breaker in your brew panel.

 

[gregkeller]

do 30 amp spa panels exist? killing two birds with one stone right?

Nevermind, just had a brain fart realizing i've already got the spa panel in place. I was more thinking for when I move the brewery indoors once I can talk my wife into that.